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“I’ll tell you after we’ve had our swim,” said the Imp 


/ 




THREE SIDES 

OF 

PARADISE GREEN 


BY 

AUGUSTA HUIELL SEAMAN 

Author of “The Girl Next Doob,” 
“The Sapphire Signet,’’ etc. 


ILLUSTRATED BY 

C. M. RELYEA / 



NEW YORK 
THE CENTURY CO. 


t 



Copyright, 1918, by 
The Centuby Co. >/ 

Published, October, 1918 


SEP 30 I9i8 ^ 


©CU503629 


•A.'U 








CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAGE 


I 

The Journal Is Begun . 

. . 

3 

II 

New Developments . 

, . 

18 

III 

The Imp Has the Best of It 

. , 

36 

IV 

The Mysterious “Monsieur” 

. , 

53 

V 

Two Accidents and a Mystery 

. , 

68 

VI 

In Monsieur’s Room . 

, . 

87 

VII 

The Imp Makes a Discovery . 

. 

99 

VIII 

The Portrait of Mystery . 

. 

114 

IX Carol Makes a Discovery of 

Her 



Own 


125 

X 

Jottings from the Journal . 


138 

XI 

Louis Springs a Surprise — and 

THE 



Consequences Thereof 

. 

151 

XII 

What the Imp Knew . 

. 

163 

XIII 

Suspicions 


175 

XIV 

A Solemn Conclave — and What 



Came of It 


190 

XV 

Monsieur’s Story .... 


202 

XVI 

August Fourth, 1914 

. 

228 


XVII The Imp Makes a Last Discovery . 246 
XVIII The End of the Journal . . . 265 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


PACING 

PACK 

“I ’ll tell you after we ’ve had our swim,” said 

the Imp Frontispiece 

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” she replied, ex- 

asperatingly 26 

It was a life-sized picture of a little boy . . 84? 

Monsieur suddenly raised his hand and gasped 

in a low voice, “Stop!” 158 

“What ’s the matter?” he asked. “Is there 

anything wrong about me anywhere?” . 176 

Not one of the three girls was ever to forget this 

strange moment in their lives .... 204< 

“Louis,” she said very quietly, “were you sorry 

to hear about — about that other matter?” 24<0 

Louis began to read aloud, stopping often to de- 
cipher a word 258 





























I 









































THREE SIDES OF 
PARADISE GREEN 










































THREE SIDES OF 
PARADISE GREEN 


CHAPTER I 

THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 

N ovember 22, 1913. it ’s ail on ac- 
count of Miss Cullingford that I ’m be- 
ginning this journal. I never would have 
thought of such a thing by myself. Neither 
would Carol. Now we ’ve both begun one, 
and it ’s just because Miss Cullingford is so 
sweet and lovely, and all the girls at Bridge- 
ton High School want to please her, — Carol 
and myself most of all. 

Miss Cullingford is our English literature 
instructor, and we all simply adore her. She ’s 
the sweetest thing! She’s little and slight, 
with fluffy light hair and dark blue eyes. And 
she ’s such an inspiration about literature and 


PARADISE GREEN 


English composition! She makes it seem ac- 
tually like a romance. They always seemed 
terribly dull, those subjects, when we had 
Miss Trotter last year. But now we ’re just 
crazy about them. 

Well, one of the things she said yesterday 
in composition class was that every one of 
us ought to keep a journal, not the kind of 
diary affair that some people keep, — all about 
the weather and the number of jars of jam 
they put up, and how Cousin Hannah called 
that day ! — but an occasional record, only writ- 
ten when we felt like it, of the things that 
happen around us and our ideas about peo- 
ple and so on. She said that the greatest 
minds of the ages had generally kept such a 
record, and that they had proved a big addi- 
tion to history and literature, too. 

Then, right there, I raised my hand and said 
that it was fine, of course, for the great minds 
to do it, especially when they lived in stirring 
times and had lots interesting to write about; 
but what was the use of just plain, ordinary 
people, as young as we were, doing it, espe- 
4 


THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 

dally when there wasn’t anything going on 
that was interesting at all, — just the same old 
thing every day? 

Miss Cullingford answered that I mustn’t 
make the mistake of thinking any life uninter- 
esting, no matter how quiet and ordinary it 
might appear to be. You can always find 
something interesting to write about any kind 
of life, if you try hard enough. And that was 
where the advantage of a journal came in, — it 
made you look around hard to find what was 
worth while, and you always found it. Also, 
it was a great help to your style in writing. 
Then she asked if any of the girls would prom- 
ise to keep a journal faithfully for a year. 
Carol and I promised. 

Well, now I ’m going to see. No life could 
possibly be more ^interesting than mine, here 
in quiet little Stafford where nothing ever hap- 
pens or ever has happened that I know of, and 
in a family that ’s awfully nice, of course, but 
as plain and uninteresting and ordinary as all 
the rest of the families around here. 

Carol does n’t feel the same as I do about it. 

5 


PARADISE GREEN 


She ’s more hopeful. That ’s because she has 
lots of imagination and is always romancing 
about people and thinking there ’s some story 
back of their lives that we don’t know. I 
suppose her journal will be awfully different 
from mine. Well, anyhow, we ’ve both be- 
gun, and now we ’ll see what happens. 

November 23. I had to stop short last night 
because I suddenly got so sleepy. Now I ’ll 
go on. I do wish we lived in Bridgeton, for 
things surely happen once in a while in a big 
town like that. Or even down in our own 
village of Stafford itself, and not way out, a 
mile off on the main road, on this silly little 
triangle called Paradise Green. Even the 
trolley does n’t run up this way ; that would be 
something ! But there ’s nothing in the world 
around here except this little triangle of a 
green, formed by the turning off of Cran- 
berry Bog Road from the River Road, and 
the short road that connects the two at the 
head of the green. I ’m sure I don’t know 
why it was ever called Paradise Green. I 
suppose if I were Carol, I ’d find out. She 
6 


THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 


probably will. She ’s always hunting up his- 
torical facts. 

Even the automobiles don’t come along this 
way. Nearly all of them keep to the State 
road over on the other side of the river. 
There are just three houses around the Green, 
one on each side, and not another dwelling 
anywhere within half a mile. So we have n’t 
many near neighbors. 

Our house stands at the head of fhe Green. 
It ’s a big square house, with a cupola on top 
and a veranda around all four sides. Fa- 
ther’s father built it when that style of house 
was just beginning to be popular, and every- 
body thought it very grand. I hate it my- 
self, because it seems so old-fashioned and 
dreary compared to those pretty new bunga- 
lows they are putting up in Bridgeton. 
Mother and Father and the Imp and I live 
here. Father does intensive farming, — he is 
just crazy about it, — and every one comes to 
Birdsey’s for ideas on the subject. 

Dave is my brother. He ’s seventeen and a 
half, and a very quiet and thoughtful sort of 
7 


PARADISE GREEN 


person. All the same, he can do his own share 
of teasing in a quiet way. He left high 
school this year because his health was n’t very 
good, and is helping Father with the farming. 
Next year he ’s going to study scientific agri- 
culture at one of the big colleges. I ’m se- 
cretly awfully fond of Dave, but just at pres- 
ent he pretends to look down on girls as 
entirely unnecessary articles in the general 
scheme of things, so Carol and I are letting 
him severely alone. 

The Imp is my sister. She ’s twelve years 
old and a perfect nuisance. Carol and I have 
named her “The Imp” because she acts just 
like one. She likes to trot around with us all 
the time, but we won’t have it. It ’s impos- 
sible to have a child of twelve continually 
hanging on to girls of fifteen or sixteen, and 
Carol and I simply won’t stand it. The 
Imp is fearfully miffed about this and spends 
her time thinking up revengeful things to do 
to us. She makes our lives perfectly miser- 
able sometimes, though we wouldn’t let her 
know it for the world. 


8 


THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 

Carol’s house is on the River Road side of 
the Green. She lives there with just her 
mother and her Aunt Agatha. The Fayres 
are distant relatives of ours, so Carol and I are 
really cousins. Their house is one of the old 
style, a real New England farmhouse, and 
they have a glorious big barn in the back, 
where we Ve all played ever since we were 
babies. One little room off the haymow Carol 
and I have fixed up as our private den and 
study. We keep our books and our fancy- 
work there, and her mother gave us an old 
desk where we do our school work. We al- 
ways keep the den locked with a padlock, be- 
cause the Imp would like to get in and rum- 
mage around. She ’s as mad as a hatter be- 
cause she can’t. She threatens to climb in the 
window sometime, but I don’t believe she could 
possibly. If she did, she ’d probably break 
her neck. 

Carol is fifteen years old, and I ’m sixteen. 
Her name is really Caroline, but she hates it 
and wants to be called “Carol” instead. She 
says it ’s so much prettier. And mine is even 
9 


PARADISE GREEN 


worse — Susan ! Could anything be more 
dreadful? I ’ve insisted on being called “Su- 
sette,” which at least is a prettier French 
form. But no one except Carol will ever call 
me that. Every one calls me either “Susie” 
or “Sue,” that is, all but the Imp. She, of 
course, knowing how much I detest it, will 
say nothing but “So-o-san” on all occasions. 
Carol she addresses by the horrible nickname 
of “Cad.” Why are some children so irritat- 
ing, I wonder? The infuriating part is that 
the Imp’s own name is really lovely — Helen 
Roberta — and she knows it, little torment that 
she is! 

Well, I have n’t yet told about the third 
house on the Green, so now I come to that. 
It ’s the one on the Cranberry Bog Road side. 
It ’s by far the most interesting of the three, 
— a long, rambling colonial farmhouse, built, 
they say, way back in seventeen hundred and 
something. It has the most fascinating addi- 
tions in all directions from the main part, and 
queer little back stairways and old slave quar- 
ters, and I don’t know what else. But the 
10 


THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 


people who live in it are the interesting part. 

To begin with, there ’s Louis. His whole 
name is Louis Charles Durant. He is seven- 
teen and goes to high school in Bridgeton with 
us. We have known him all our lives, and 
he ’s the nicest, j oiliest boy we know. But 
the people he lives with I ’ve never understood 
at all, and if there were any romance or mys- 
tery about any one around here, it would be 
about them. 

Come to think of it, they are mysterious. 
Carol has always said so, but I never thought 
much about it. And that only goes to she . 
that Miss Cullingford is right. Keeping a 
journal does certainly make you go about with 
your eyes open wider and gives you an interest 
in things you never thought worth while be- 
fore. I never thought or cared a bit about 
Louis’s folks before, and now I see they ’re 
full of possibilities. 

November 24. Fell asleep again last night 
while I was writing. I guess it ’s because 
there ’s nothing very exciting to write about. 
However, I ’ll go on from where I left off 
11 


PARADISE GREEN 

about Louis’s folks. First, there ’s the old 
man. Louis’s father and mother have been 
dead a number of years. I never remember 
seeing either of them. So he lives with this 
old man, who, they say, is his guardian. His 
name is John Meadows, or at least that is 
what he is always called around here. But 
Louis says that he is French, and that his real 
name is Jean Mettot. He is very old; he 
must be eighty at least. And he is very fee- 
ble now, too. He sits all day long in a great 
armchair by the parlor window. He never 
reads anything but the papers and some great, 
heavy volumes of French history, but he spends 
a great deal of time thinking and dreaming, 
while he looks way off over the meadows to- 
ward the river. 

Then there ’s his daughter, Miss Meadows. 
She ’s about forty or fifty years old, I should 
think. Louis says her name is Yvonne. Cer- 
tainly, that ’s a fascinating French name. 
She ’s very dark and handsome and quick in 
her ways, but she ’s very, very quiet and si- 
lent. I never had a real conversation with 
12 


THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 


her in my life, though I ’ve talked to her a 
great many times. I do all the talking, and 
she nods or smiles or says “Yes” and “No,” 
and that is absolutely all. I feel as if I ’d 
never really know her, if I talked to her a 
hundred years. They have one servant, a big 
French peasant from Normandy, who cooks 
the meals and takes care of the garden and 
house. 

All this does n’t sound very strange, how- 
ever. And there is something very mysterious 
about them, — at least, so Carol has always said. 
I never paid much attention to the thing be- 
fore, or noticed it. The curious part of it all 
is the way they treat Louis. He is n’t any 
real relative, so he says. His parents and 
their parents have just been dear friends from 
a long way back. It ’s plain that they think 
the world of him, too, just as much as if he 
were a relative. But there ’s something more. 
They are continually watching him with anx- 
ious eyes. They guard him as if he were n’t 
able to take care of himself any more than 
a baby. They don’t let him have half the 
13 


PARADISE GREEN 

liberty and fun that ordinary boys have. 
Lots of mothers and fathers, who love their 
children to distraction, are n’t half as fussy 
and concerned about them as these two peo- 
ple are about a boy who is n’t even a relative. 
It makes Louis awfully annoyed, for he hates 
like anything to be coddled. Once he fell out 
of an apple-tree and broke a rib, and they 
nearly went wild. He had a fever that night 
and lay in a sort of stupor. But when he 
was coming out of it he heard them talking 
awfully queerly about him and wringing their 
hands and whispering that “he would never, 
never forgive us if Monsieur Louis were to 
die.” 

Who “he” was, or why his Aunt Yvonne 
and his Uncle Jean (as he calls them) should 
allude to him as “Monsieur Louis,” was some- 
thing Louis could n’t understand. And some- 
how, when he was better, he didn’t like to 
ask. 

They have taught him French, and with 
them he always has to speak that language. 
But he does n’t like it, because he says he ’s 
14 


THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 

an American citizen and would rather talk 
“United States” than anything else. He ’s 
awfully patriotic and proud of this country, 
and he can’t understand why this should bother 
Mr. and Miss Meadows. But it somehow 
does. He ’s sure of it, for they won’t let him 
talk about it, and are always telling him that 
his great grandfather was born in France and 
that he should be very proud of it. 

Then there ’s another thing, too, that seems 
to worry them a lot. Louis is crazy about me- 
chanical engineering. He declares he ’s go- 
ing to study that exclusively, when he ’s 
through high school, and become an expert 
in it. This nearly drives them wild. They 
want him to be a “statesman,” as they call it, 
and study law and history and diplomacy and 
all that sort of thing. 

“You can serve your country best that way,” 
they are always telling him. 

Once he said to them : 

“The United States has plenty of that sort 
already. I want to go in for something spe- 
cial.” And he says they never answered a 
15 


PARADISE GREEN 


word, but just looked queerly at each other 
and walked off. 

Another time he found that the lock on 
their kitchen door wouldn’t work, so he un- 
screwed it and took it out. He was fixing it 
when along came his Aunt Yvonne. When 
she saw what he was doing she burst into tears 
and rushed away, muttering, “The ancient 
blood! It will ruin everything!” — or some- 
thing in French like that. 

All these things do not happen frequently, 
of course, but when something like it does oc- 
cur, it puzzles Louis dreadfully. He always 
talks it over with us when we come home to- 
gether from Bridgeton High School on the 
trolley, so that ’s why I happen to know about 
it. 

Well, now I ’ve begun this journal by tell- 
ing all about ourselves and our homes and 
everything else I can think of. But as I read 
it over, it does n’t sound one bit exciting or 
likely to become “an interesting contribution 
to history,” as Miss Cullingford would say. 
I wonder what she ’d think about it. I ’m 
16 


THE JOURNAL IS BEGUN 

glad I did n’t promise to show her my jour- 
nal, for I ’m not very proud of this sample. 
I ’m crazy to see what Carol has written. 
We ’re going to compare our journals to- 
morrow. 

One thing is certain, though. I ’m not go- 
ing to write another word till I ’ve something 
more interesting to talk about, even if I have 
to wait six months ! 


17 


CHAPTER II 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 

D ECEMBER l, 1913. I haven’t writ- 
ten a thing in this journal for over a 
week, for a number of reasons. In the first 
place, I ’d made up my mind not to write till 
I had something worth writing about. In the 
second place, we ’ve been having some exams 
at school that took a lot of work to prepare 
for. Third, Thanksgiving holidays came 
along, and we were all pretty busy and had a 
lot of engagements. Altogether, I have n’t 
had a minute till now — and something has hap- 
pened that ’s rather interesting to write about. 

Carol is ever so much better at this journal 
business than I am. She writes nearly every 
other day. But then, she does n’t mind writ- 
ing about all the little ordinary occurrences, — 
the things she does about the housework and 
18 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 


her studies and so on. But I simply can’t do 
it. If I can’t tell about something a little 
out of the ordinary, I won’t write at all. And 
as nothing besides the usual ever happens in 
either one of our two households (or at school 
or in the village!) , I find myself turning more 
and more to Louis and his affairs for interest. 

It ’s strange ( I ’ve heard other people speak 
of the same thing, too) that when you once 
get to thinking about a certain thing, all sorts 
of other ideas and events connected with it 
will suddenly begin to appear. I never gave 
a thought to Louis and his affairs before I be- 
gan this journal. He has always lived here, 
and we ’ve always known him and never 
thought there was anything strange about his 
folks. But now so many queer little things 
have happened and so many strange ideas 
have come to us (Carol and myself, I mean) 
about that house across the Green that it seems 
as if there must be some mystery right near 
our commonplace lives after all. 

Before I tell what happened, however, I 
must remark that the Imp has been particu- 
19 


PARADISE GREEN 


larly exasperating lately. She got wind some- 
how or other (at first we could n't think how) 
that Carol and I are keeping journals. Later 
I discovered that it was because Carol had 
carelessly left hers on the desk in our den, and 
had forgotten to padlock the door. Carol is 
so thoughtless at times, because she gets to 
going about with “her head in the clouds,” as 
her Aunt Agatha says, and does n’t remember 
half the things she ought to do. It ’s gener- 
ally when she ’s thinking up some verses. 
Carol does compose very pretty verses. Miss 
Cullingford has praised them highly. But 
she ’s always awfully absent-minded when 
she ’s thinking about them. 

Well, the way we learned that the Imp had 
discovered our journals was by a large sheet 
of paper pinned to Carol’s barn-door. This 
was written on it : 

November 29. How these precious autumn days fly 
by ! Each one is like a polished jewel. I made my bed 
and dusted my room at eight a. m. Then I composed a 
sweet little poem on “Feeding the Pigs.” After that I 
slept in the hammock on the porch till lunchtime. The 
days are all too short for these many duties ! 

20 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 

Of course we were furious. Carol con- 
fessed to me that she had left her journal open 
on the desk in the den, and the last entry was 
awfully like what that little wretch had writ- 
ten, only Carol had spoken of composing a 
poem on “Feeding the Pigeons.” She had 
slept on the porch all morning, because it was 
a lovely mild day and I was away with Mother 
at a luncheon in Bridgeton. But she had n’t 
mentioned this in her journal. 

It is perfectly useless to argue with the Imp, 
or to scold or reason with her. She can go 
you one better every single time. We con- 
cluded that the best thing to do was ignore 
the incident entirely. So we left the paper 
hanging on the barn-door till the wind blew 
it away. A course of action like that makes 
the Imp madder than if you got purple in the 
face with fury. I ’ve advised Carol not to 
leave her journal in the den any more, but to 
keep it in her room, and she says she will. 

All this, however, is n’t telling what hap- 
pened to Louis. He told us about it this 
afternoon while we were resting on our ve- 
21 


PARADISE GREEN 


randa after a hot session of pitching the basket- 
ball about. After a while we just had to sit 
down and get our breath, and the Imp strolled 
off by herself somewhere. It was then that 
Louis told us the strange thing that happened 
yesterday. 

It seems that his Aunt Yvonne has gone to 
New York on a visit for a few days, and he 
has been alone with his Uncle John and the 
servant. Yesterday afternoon, about five 
o’clock, a boy rode up from the village on a 
bicycle with a telegram for his uncle. The 
old gentleman opened it, but couldn’t read it 
because he had mislaid his glasses. So he got 
Louis to read it to him. Louis says the thing 
was a cablegram from some place in France — 
he can’t remember the name — and that it was 
the queerest message. It ran like this : 

Time almost ripe. Have you the necessary papers? 
Sail next month. 

When his uncle heard this he became ter- 
ribly excited and began to walk up and down 
the room very fast. But when Louis asked 
22 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 


him what it all meant, all he would say was: 

“It is not for you to inquire or for me to 
explain just yet, Monsieur!” Louis says his 
uncle often calls him “monsieur,” and he can’t 
understand why. He thinks it ’s generally 
when the old gentleman forgets himself or is 
excited. But it makes Louis feel very queer. 

After that his uncle would n’t say anything 
more, but Louis says he began to rummage 
around through all his letters and papers, and 
looked through all his books and in all the 
closets, evidently hunting for something he 
could n’t find. And the more he hunted, the 
more nervous and excitable he grew. Every 
once in a while he would exclaim, “Ah, why is 
not that Yvonne here?” By bedtime he was 
pretty well worked up, for it was evident that 
he could n’t find what he was searching for. 
Louis tried and tried to get him to explain 
and let him help in the hunt. But the old 
gentleman would only mutter, “No, no ! That 
cannot be!” Louis says he doesn’t think his 
uncle slept all night, because he heard him 
rummaging about in all sorts of places till 
23 


PARADISE GREEN 


nearly morning. To-day he seems terribly 
used up. He just sits in his chair by the win- 
dow, staring out and watching for his daugh- 
ter to come. Louis says he had to go down 
to the village at eight o’clock last night with 
a telegram, telling his Aunt Yvonne to come 
home at once. 

How mysterious it all sounds! Louis de- 
clares he can’t imagine what it means, and it 
makes him very uneasy, because he is almost 
certain that it is something concerning himself. 
He says he sometimes thinks his uncle is plan- 
ning to send him to France before he gets 
much older, to complete his studies there and 
to become a French citizen, and he doesn’t 
want to go. 

My idea was that perhaps he had some rela- 
tives there and that they wanted him to come 
back. But Louis says his uncle has often told 
him that he has n’t any relatives living. And 
if he had, he says there ’s no reason why there 
should be all this secrecy about it. But he 
can’t understand who the people are with 
whom his uncle is corresponding. 

24 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 


Carol’s opinion was that perhaps Louis was 
a descendant of some titled person, — a count 
or a marquis or something like that, — and that 
these people are trying to bring him back to 
his legal title and estates. Louis simply 
hooted at that. He says that his great grand- 
father was a plain “monsieur” when he came 
over here long ago; that he never had been 
anything else and did n’t want to be. So that 
Carol’s idea was all nonsense. Carol is always 
romancing like that, and generally getting 
laughed at. Just at this point the Imp came 
suddenly around the corner of the veranda and 
demanded : 

“What are you talking about? I warrant 
dollars to doughnuts it ’s about Louis.” 

That child has a perfectly uncanny way of 
lighting on just the thing you don’t care to 
have her know about. She ’s a veritable 
mind-reader. None of us cared at that par- 
ticular moment to explain what we were dis- 
cussing, so no one said a word. Meanwhile 
the Imp eyed us with a grin. And before 
• any one could think of something to say that 
25 


PARADISE GREEN 


would change the subject, she exploded this 
bomb in our midst: 

“Louis’ Aunt Yvonne has come home. 
She ’s having a fit!” 

Louis just scooted for his own house as fast 
as he could. We asked her how she knew Miss 
Meadows was having a fit, and she said : 

“Because I saw her drive up and get out 
of the hack and run up the steps. I had 
climbed a tree in their side yard to look into 
an oriole’s nest, and I heard her open the door 
and call out a lot of things in French to old 
Mr. Meadows.” 

The Imp is terribly quick about picking up 
languages, and she has teased Louis into teach- 
ing her quite a little French, which he de- 
clared to us she picked up with lightning speed. 
It makes Carol and me furious sometimes to 
feel that she has this advantage over us, for 
we have n’t come to French yet in high school, 
and are so busy digging out our Latin that 
we have n’t either time or interest to learn an- 
other language on the side. Well, it humili- 
ated me to pieces to have to ask her what Miss 
26 



“Wouldn’t you like to know?” she replied, exasperatingly 

































NEW DEVELOPMENTS 

Yvonne said, but I swallowed my pride and 
did so. All the little wretch answered, as she 
walked away, was : 

“Would n’t you like to know?” 

We didn’t see anything more of Louis to- 
day, and Carol and I are just burning up with 
curiosity. I could shake the Imp till her teeth 
chattered ! 

There was a cosy group gathered about the 
open fire in the Birdseys’ big, comfortable, 
and not too tidy living-room. At a large cen- 
ter table, drawn close to the blaze, sat Carol 
and Sue, scribbling away for dear life in two 
large, fat note-books and covering the table 
with many trial sheets of mathematical figur- 
ing. They were exact opposites in appear- 
ance. Sue was tall and slim to the point of 
angularity. She had dark eyes, and her dark 
hair was coiled heavily about her head. Carol 
was short and plump, with dreamy blue eyes 
and wavy auburn hair that still hung in a thick 
braid. 

On the davenport, curled up like a kitten in 

n 


PARADISE GREEN 


one corner, sat the Imp, or “Bobs,” as she was 
generally called, — her chin propped in her 
hands, a book balanced against her knees. In 
sharp contrast to the other two girls was her 
tiny body and dark, straight hair, and the big 
blue eyes that could at one moment gaze with 
liquid, angelic candor, and at the next snap 
with impish mischief. There was mischief in 
them at the moment, as she stared reflectively 
at the two girls bent over the table. Unaware 
of her gaze, they scribbled on, comparing notes 
at intervals. 

“Do you get the answer 4ab(ab+2bm) J to 
your third problem?” presently inquired Sue, 
without looking up. 

“No, I don’t!” moaned Carol in depressed 
tones, pushing aside her work and running her 
fingers through her hair. “I don’t get any- 
thing at all.” 

“Well, don’t worry. Let 9 s see what ’s 
wrong. Hand over your work and I ’ll com- 
pare it with mine,” said her companion sooth- 
ingly. She dragged Carol’s note-book to- 
ward her and compared it with her own. 

28 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 

“Oh, I see what you ’ve done!” she ex- 
claimed in a moment. “In the first equation 
you did n’t put down — ” 

At this instant the Imp, whose eyes had 
been smoldering with suppressed mischief, 
yawned loudly, stretched herself, and remarked 
with apparent irrelevance: 

“It ’s a long day when you don’t go to 
school, is n’t it?” 

Both girls sat up with a jerk and surveyed 
her sternly. 

“Do you mean to say that you haven’t 
been to school to-day?” they demanded in a 
breath, and Sue added, “I ’d like to know 
why not.” 

“I had a bad headache this morning, Susan,” 
explained the Imp sweetly. “Mother let me 
stay home. I was all right by two o’clock, 
though. Louis and I had a game of basket- 
ball before it began to rain.” 

Her companions glanced at each other with 
a meaning expression, none of which was lost 
on the Imp. With a grin of satisfaction, she 
proceeded : 


29 


PARADISE GREEN 

“His aunt called him in just before we fin- 
ished, and he did n’t come out again.” 

With a visible effort, Sue inquired : 

“Did he say why he was n’t at school to-day? 
We thought it rather queer when he did n’t 
come, but perhaps, after the strange thing that 
happened yesterday — ” 

This was precisely the trap into which the 
Imp had planned that they should fall. 

“I did n’t ask him,” she remarked, with ex- 
asperating calm. 

“No doubt you did n’t,” retorted Carol heat- 
edly, “but perhaps he told you without being 
asked.” 

“Perhaps he did,” returned the Imp, “and 
perhaps he told me a lot more. However, I 
must say bye-bye for the present. I ’ve got to 
go and study my lessons somewhere where I 
won’t be disturbed !” 

She scrambled down and sailed out of the 
room, waving airily to them from the door- 
way. 

“Isn’t she simply maddening!” exclaimed 
Sue. “The idea of saying she had to go and 
30 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 

study! I never knew her to study a thing in 
my life. She seems to know her lessons by 
instinct.” 

“But what do you suppose Louis told her?” 
mused Carol. 

“Not much, or I miss my guess,” returned 
Sue. “She ’s only trying to tease us. But it 
is strange that he stayed home to-day. Some- 
thing serious must be the matter. He has n’t 
missed a day this term before.” 

“But if it was serious,” argued Carol, “why 
should he be out playing with the Imp?” 

At this moment the door opened and a tall, 
slender boy of seventeen or eighteen strolled 
in, his hands in his overcoat pockets, his cheeks 
and overcoat still wet with the driving rain. 

“Hello, girls!” he remarked, warming his 
hands by the blaze of the open fire. 

“Hello, Dave!” they replied. “Where did 
you come from?” 

“Been over to Louis’s. Queer thing about 
it, too,” he commented, dropping down on the 
vacant davenport. 

“What?” they gasped in breathless chorus. 

31 


PARADISE GREEN 


He looked at them inquiringly. 

“Why all the astonishment on your part?” 
he demanded. “What do you know about it, 
anyway?” 

“Oh, a lot of queer things seem to be hap- 
pening to Louis lately,” explained Carol. 
“But go on! Tell us all about it.” 

“Well, Father did n’t need me to-night, so 
I thought I ’d stroll over to Louis’s and see 
if he wanted a little session with that higher 
mathematics course that he and I are working 
at together on our own hook. I rang at the 
front door several times, but didn’t get any 
response. Then I tried the back door, with 
no better luck. There was a light in the par- 
lor, too, but, on glancing in the window, I saw 
that no one was there. Mr. Meadows had evi- 
dently gone to bed. I had just started out 
to the barn, thinking that Louis might be in 
his work-room there, when I noticed a light 
in one of the cellar windows. I then felt sure 
that Louis was down there, clearing up or 
getting vegetables for his aunt, so I went over 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 

and peeped in, thinking to give him a surprise. 
It was I who got the surprise, though!” 

“What did you see?” demanded Sue in an 
awestricken whisper. 

“Funniest sight ever! There Miss Yvonne 
was standing with a lamp in her hand, and 
Louis, with a pickaxe and shovel, had pried 
out one of the stones in the foundation near 
the big chimney and was poking around in the 
hole he ’d made, while Miss Yvonne stared 
into it, those big black eyes of hers as round 
as saucers. While I was still looking, she 
shook her head, motioned Louis to put the 
stone back, and pointed to another a little far- 
ther along. I began to feel as if I ’d lit on 
something that was n’t any business of mine, 
so instead of knocking on the window as I ’d 
intended, I just got up and came away. 
Guess they must be hunting for buried treas- 
ure or something. Never knew they suspected 
the presence of any in their old ranch. Louis 
did n’t look as if he were particularly enjoying 
the job, however.” 


PARADISE GREEN 


“Well, that ’s about all,” he ended, suddenly 
remembering what, in the excitement of the 
little adventure, he had momentarily forgot- 
ten, — his superior pose toward all girls and to- 
ward his sister in particular. Then he van- 
ished swiftly out of the room, lest they be 
moved to ask him any further questions and 
lest he be tempted to answer. 

After he had gone, Sue and Carol stared at 
each other in a maze of excited conjecture. 

“What do you make of it?” sighed Carol. 

“I don’t make anything of it,” declared Sue. 
“It sounds too mysterious for words. But I 
know this much. They weren’t hunting for 
buried treasure. It ’s for papers of some kind. 
I ’m sure of it. But what can they be about, 
and why should they be in the cellar?” 

But Carol was off on another tack. 

“At last we ’ll have something worth while 
to write about in our journals,” she remarked. 
“Don’t you ever think again, Susette Birdsey, 
that nothing exciting happens in our lives ! I 
can fill up three or four pages about it.” 

Her companion assented absently. 

34 


NEW DEVELOPMENTS 


“Do you realize,” she suddenly exclaimed, 
4 ‘that here ’s where we got way ahead of the 
Imp? Serves her right for playing us such 
a mean trick and going out of the room. I 
call it a piece of downright luck!” 


CHAPTER III 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 

D ECEMBER 31. This is New Year’s 
Eve and it ’s nearly twelve o’clock. 
Carol and I promised each other that we ’d sit 
up and see the old year out, and write in our 
journals. Carol is finishing a lovely poem 
she ’s been writing, called, “On New Year’s 
Eve.” It begins: 

The silent snow is falling light, 

On New Year’s Eve, on New Year’s Eve, — 

That ’s all I can remember of it. The only 
trouble is that there is n’t any snow falling to- 
night. There ’s a regular thaw on, and it ’s 
dreadfully warm and mushy. 

There ’s something awfully solemn about 
New Year’s Eve. It makes you feel sorry for 
all the mean things you ’ve done, and you form 
all sorts of good resolutions for the future. 
36 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 


At least, I do, and so does Carol. But I have 
my doubts about the Imp. I don’t believe she 
is sorry for a single thing she ’s ever done. 
She does n’t act so, anyway. 

And speaking of her, I ’ve made it my prin- 
cipal resolution for the new year to be more 
patient with her. I suppose every one has to 
have some great trial in life, and the Imp is 
certainly the chief one for Carol and me. 
Lately she has been more than usually infuri- 
ating. Every afternoon during the past 
month she has inquired of us, “Have you writ- 
ten in your journals to-day, my dears? If 
not, run and do so at once.” 

When she first began to say that, I made 
the mistake of asking her how she knew I was 
keeping a journal. She retorted: 

“Oh, that ’s easy. I found out that Cad 
was, so of course I knew you were up to the 
same trick. You ’re as like each other as two 
penny hat-pins.” 

All I could think of to answer was : 

“Well, I don’t see that it is any one’s affair 
but our own, if we are keeping them.” 

37 


PARADISE GREEN 


To this she returned : 

“Who said it was?” 

“You did,” I retorted, “and I ’ll be obliged 
to you not to take it upon yourself to remind 
us about writing in them.” 

All she replied to this was : 

“Louis’s folks got another cablegram this 
morning. You ’d better put that in.” 

Then she walked off and would n’t say an- 
other word. That ’s just exactly like her. 
She ’s bound to light on the very thing you ’d 
rather she did n’t know about. And she al- 
ways seems to have inside information about 
something you ’d give your head to know about 
and never seem to get hold of. How she knew 
about the cablegram, I can’t think, unless she 
saw the messenger-boy come up with it and 
questioned him afterward. 

We ’ve never said a word to Louis about the 
queer thing Dave told us he saw on that rainy 
night nearly a month ago. At first I wanted 
to, but Carol said that it would look as if we 
had been spying on them, and, in thinking it 
over, I agreed with her. Another thing, I felt 
38 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 

sure that if he wanted us to know, or thought 
we ought to know, he ’d tell us himself and 
explain what it was all about. But he never 
has, so either he thinks we ought n’t to know, 
or his folks have warned him not to speak of 
it. I ’m quite certain it must be the latter, 
because several times he has almost been on 
the point of speaking of something and sud- 
denly stopped short, as if he remembered he 
oughtn’t to. Dave, of course, has been as 
mum as an oyster ever since. He ’s a dear fel- 
low in lots of ways, but he does act too absurdly 
at present about us girls. You would think 
we had n’t any more sense than babies in a 
nursery, the way he treats us, — not exactly un- 
kind, but just sort of condescending and su- 
perior. Mother says he ’ll grow out of it soon. 
He and Louis are stijl great chums, but they 
don’t see as much of each other since Dave left 
high school. 

Nothing further that ’s strange seems to 
have happened over at the house across the 
Green, except for one little thing. A few 
days before Christmas I went over to return 
39 


PARADISE GREEN 


to Miss Yvonne a package of spice that Mother 
had had to borrow in a hurry, and I found the 
place in the greatest upset. Miss Yvonne 
seemed to be giving the whole establishment 
a thorough housecleaning, which is rather 
strange, for she gave it the usual autumn clean- 
ing only this last October. I can’t for the life 
of me see why she wanted to do it all over 
again so soon. I spoke to Louis about it next 
day, and he said she was having some paper- 
ing and painting done, too. 

They were all upset during the Christmas 
season, and had to eat their Christmas dinner 
in the kitchen. Louis says it was a miserable 
holiday for him, all except our party in the 
evening. I can’t imagine why Miss Yvonne 
should do such a curious thing. And Louis 
says she ’s having one big room that they ’ve 
never used fixed up in great style, — fresh, 
handsome wall-paper and new furniture and a 
brass bed, and everything to match. 

“Do you think she expects any visitors?” I 
said. 

“Why, no!” he answered, looking awfully 
40 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 


surprised. “She has n’t said anything about it 
to me.” 

Then I asked him if he knew they had re- 
ceived a cablegram two weeks before, and he 
was astonished and said that he didn’t, and 
asked how I knew. I told him what the Imp 
had said, and as soon as he heard this, he an- 
swered : 

“It ’s more of that beastly mystery, Sue, 
and I suppose I ought n’t to talk about it, be- 
cause I ’ve promised them I would n’t. I hate 
it ! I hate it!” 

I never saw Louis so worked up before. 
But he would n’t go on talking about it any 
more, — because of his promise, I suppose, — so 
there matters rest for the present. 

New Year’s Day, January 1, 1914. I just 
stopped a while ago to listen to the village 
church-bells ring twelve o’clock. I turned out 
the light and opened the window and leaned 
out. It all sounded very solemn, but it would 
have been much more impressive if there had 
been a lovely white fall of snow, with full 
41 , 


PARADISE GREEN 


moonlight glistening on it. Instead of that, 
it was raining and everything smelled damp 
and drippy. I like things to seem appropri- 
ate, but somehow they never seem to be, — at 
least, not the way you read about them in 
books. 

While I was looking out, I happened to 
glance over at Louis’s house and saw such a 
queer thing. Way up in one of the little attic- 
windows there was a light. After a moment 
I made out that it was from an oil-lamp that 
some one was carrying about, for it did n’t re- 
main steady long at a time. I hated to be spy- 
ing on our neighbors, but I could n’t have taken 
my eyes away from that sight if I ’d been of- 
fered a thousand dollars. It w r as too uncanny. 
In another moment I discovered that it was 
Miss Yvonne moving slowly about in front 
of the immense chimney that is opposite the 
window, feeling carefully of every brick and 
picking at them with her fingers, as if to learn 
if any were loose. It seemed the strangest 
thing to be doing at midnight on New Year’s 
Eve, but all of a sudden it dawned on me that 
42 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 

she must be trying to discover if any brick was 
loose because — something might be hidden be- 
hind it! 

I got so excited about it that I could hardly 
stand still. But the next minute the light dis- 
appeared, and I realized that she had given 
up the search and gone downstairs. Whether 
she found what she was looking for or not, I 
don’t know. Probably she did n’t, or she 
would have stayed longer. 

After that I shut my window, lit my light, 
and now am finishing this. I wonder if Carol 
saw what I did? She was going to look out 
of her window at midnight, too. But she 
could n’t have seen it, I ’m sure, because her 
house is on the other side of Louis’s, and that 
attic-window wouldn’t have been visible to her. 
My, won’t I have something exciting to tell 
her to-morrow! 

Mother has just opened her door and called 
out “Happy New Year!” to me. She told me 
to put out my light and go to bed, or I ’d fall 
asleep at Anita Brown’s party to-morrow 
night — no, I mean to-night. I guess I ’ll have 
4S 


PARADISE GREEN 

to end this for the present, hut I don’t believe 
I ’ll be able to sleep. Life is certainly grow- 
ing more and more exciting, with your neigh- 
bors receiving mysterious cablegrams from 
abroad and digging in the cellar and hunting 
about in the attic at midnight and all the other 
curious doings. I hope it does n’t seem like 
prying into their affairs to have discovered all 
these things. Each time it was quite by acci- 
dent. But Mother and Father have always 
taught us how horrid it was to be curious about 
your neighbors. Well, as long as I don’t de- 
liberately pry or talk about it to any one ex- 
cept Carol, I ’m sure no harm will be done. 

As this is my first entry in my journal for 
1914, 1 ’ll wish everybody a “Happy New 
Year” and hope this will be a glorious good 
year for every one in the world. 

Sue Birdsey lay on the davenport by the 
fire. She was covered by an afghan and her 
face was propped up on a hot-water-bag. On 
the table near her was a huge packet of ab- 
sorbent cotton and several bottles of medi- 
44 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 


cine. Near her hand lay a book, unheeded. 
Unheeded, also, was the brilliant mid- January 
sun streaming in at the west windows. Of 
what use are books and sunlight, indeed, in the 
face of a raging toothache! On the opposite 
side of the hearth sat Carol, disconsolately urg- 
ing a renewal of some one of the medicines. 

“It ’s no earthly use!” moaned Sue. “I ’ve 
tried it a dozen times. Wait till the Imp gets 
back with that stuff your Aunt Agatha recom- 
mended. I ’ll try that, and if it does n’t stop 
it, I ’ll walk straight down to the dentist and 
have it out.” 

“I believe it ’s going to ulcerate,” remarked 
Carol, like the “ Job’s Comforter” she was al- 
ways inclined to be. 

Sue’s only reply was to hurl a sofa-cushion 
at her and subside again on the hot-water-bag. 
No further remarks were exchanged. The 
sun sank in a few moments and the room grew 
dark. Carol turned on the light and muttered 
something about how long the Imp was. 
After a few more gloomy moments, punctuated 
by groans from Sue, the door was flung open 
45 


PARADISE GREEN 

and the Imp rushed in, bringing a blast of 
chilly air with her. 

“Here it is!” she cried. “I had to wait an 
awful while for him to get it ready. You fix 
her up, Cad.” 

While Carol administered the remedy ac- 
cording to directions, the Imp straightened out 
the rumpled afghan and refilled the hot-water- 
bag. She could be singularly helpful in case 
of sickness or an emergency, and seemed ac- 
tualty to delight in being of use, — a change of 
demeanor that never failed to astonish the 
other two girls. So accustomed were they to 
regard the Imp as their sworn enemy that this 
angelic demeanor quite disarmed them. 

Five minutes after the remedy had been ap- 
plied Sue sat up with a jerk. 

“Hurrah! The pain’s all gone. It went 
like magic. I feel like a new creature. No 
more of this for me!” She rose from the 
couch, pushing away the signs of her temporary 
invalidism. “Imp, you certainly are a trump. 
Come, Carol, let ’s get at our work for to- 
morrow.” 

46 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 

Ten minutes later they were busy at the long 
table, and the Imp again settled on the couch, 
apparently deep in a book. It was Sue who 
looked up after a while, to find her eyeing 
them with the pleased, quiet, provoking smile 
whose meaning they had come to know so well. 
The desire to investigate its cause proved, as 
usual, irresistible. 

“What are you grinning at, Bobs?” Sue de- 
manded. “You look as pleased as Punch. 
Anything happened?” It was well always to 
placate her by appearing agreeable. 

“Oh, nothing special!” she replied, in a man- 
ner that made them perfectly certain there was 
something very special. “I happened to no- 
tice a while ago that an automobile drove up 
to Louis’s gate, and that Miss Yvonne got out 
and began to give the chauffeur a regular 
tongue-lashing in French, because he ’d driven 
up from the station over the joltiest road, in- 
stead of taking the smooth one. He does n‘t 
understand French, so he didn’t in the least 
get what she was driving at. It made me 
laugh.” 


47 


PARADISE GREEN 


“But what under the sun was Miss Yvonne 
coming up from the station in an automobile 
for?” Carol exclaimed. “She has n’t been 
away. She has n’t even been to Bridgeton, for 
I ’ve seen her around early this afternoon. 
She always walks up from the village. You 
must be crazy.” 

“She walked down to the village about four 
o’clock,” the Imp informed them. “I saw her 
start off. And I guess she had good reason 
to come back in an auto.” The Imp went on 
reading after this, just as if she had n’t any 
idea that she was driving them wild. 

“Well, what was the reason?” inquired Sue, 
trying to look only mildly interested. “Was 
she ill, or did she have a lot of bundles to carry, 
or was she in a great hurry?” 

“I ’ll tell you the reason,” answered the Imp, 
“if you ’ll give me that nice, fat, new blank- 
book you bought the other day. It ’s worth 
it, too.” 

“I ’ll do nothing of the sort!” Sue cried in- 
dignantly. “I have a special use for that 
book,” — as a matter of fact, she was going to 
48 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 

re-copy her journal in it — “and I ’ll find out 
some other way.” 

“You won’t find out anything before to- 
morrow afternoon, probably,” the Imp re- 
turned, “for Louis is n’t going to school. He 
told me so.” 

Sue made up her mind that she was n’t go- 
ing to give in to her, but Carol broke up that 
intention. 

“Oh, give it to her!” she whispered. “I ’ve 
another just as good that you can have. 
And I ’m wild to hear what ’s up across the 
Green.” 

Sue handed the blank-book across to the 
Imp, and said, as witheringly as she could: 

“Here, take it, if you want it as badly as 
that! Of course you know you’re taking a 
mean advantage of us, but that ’s nothing to 
you. Fire away!” 

“I thought you couldn’t wait till to-mor- 
row,” the Imp retorted. “Well, here goes. 
Miss Yvonne rode up in an auto because — she 
had some one with her.” 

“Who was it?” cried Carol impatiently. 

49 


PARADISE GREEN 


“Don’t dole out your information in little 
drops. Tell us the rest.” 

“I did n’t ask the person’s name,” said the 
Imp, in that maddeningly polite way she 
sometimes assumed. “It did n’t seem any af- 
fair of mine.” 

“Naturally,” Sue answered, as calmly as she 
could. “We ’d only be much obliged to know 
whether it was a man, woman, girl, boy, or 
baby. Please remember you ’ve got the book 
and that you have n’t paid for it yet.” 

“I always pay my debts,” she answered, try- 
ing not to giggle, “and I only agreed to tell 
you the reason why Miss Yvonne came up in 
the auto. I ’ve done that. But since you ’re 
so hard up for information, I ’ll hand out a 
little more small change — just because I ’m 
sorry for you. It was a man, a very old man, 
all wrapped up in a big fur coat.” 

“Did Louis know he was coming?” Carol de- 
manded. 

“Oh, no ! Louis did n’t know,” answered 
the Imp, “but I did; for I heard Miss Yvonne 
50 


THE IMP HAS THE BEST OF IT 

telling old Mr. Meadows yesterday, when they 
were out by the barn, that all was ready for 
‘Monsieur’s' arrival to-morrow.” 

“You ’re a mean little thing to be always 
eavesdropping about,” cried Sue, “and meaner 
yet never to tell us a word of what you hear.” 

“You ’re quite mistaken if you think I eaves- 
drop, as you call it,” retorted the Imp indig- 
nantly. “I was in plain sight all the time yes- 
terday, patching up that snow-fort of Louis’s, 
and they both saw me. Only Miss Yvonne 
spoke in French, and I guess she does n’t know 
that I understand it. As for not telling you 
two anything, I ’d like to know why I should. 
You never tell anything to me, that is, if you 
can possibly help it.” This was entirely true, 
as they were bound to confess. 

The Imp took up her book and marched 
huffily to the door. But before she left the 
room she turned and called back: 

“It ’s a thankless job trying to be nice to 
you two. You ’re absolutely ungrateful. 
And I ’ll tell you right now, I know one piece 
51 


PARADISE GREEN 


of information, besides all this, that you ’d give 
your eye-teeth to hear, — but you won’t. It ’s 
about who this mysterious ‘monsieur’ is!” 

With that she went out, slamming the door 
behind her. 


52 


CHAPTER IV 

THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR” 


HERE had been a heavy fall of snow 



A during the night. It lay on trees and 
hedges in great, powdery clumps, and drifted 
over the Green in huge, wind-swept hillocks. 
But the sky that afternoon was blue and cloud- 
less, and the click of snow-shovels rang out on 
the still air. In front of the Birdseys’ gate 
Carol and Sue were frantically shoveling a 
footway, not because they had to, but for the 
sheer joy of exercise in the invigorating air. 

“It ’s queer we have n’t seen anything of 
Louis since that visitor came,” commented 
Carol. “He ’s missing a lot of time at school, 
and I ’m sure he hates that.” 

“Yes, it’s three days since ‘Monsieur,’ as 
the Imp calls him, came. We haven’t seen 
anything of him, either,” added Sue. “Do you 


53 


PARADISE GREEN 


suppose he ’s going to stay shut up and in- 
visible all the time? Who do you suppose he 
is, anyway, and doesn’t it make you furious 
to think that the Imp knows, or says she does, 
and that we don’t?” 

“There ’s Louis now,” was Carol’s only re- 
ply. “He ’s just come out to shovel his walk,” 
and she waved her own shovel to him in greet- 
ing. 

In another moment Louis had strolled over 
to join them. He was of medium height, a 
slenderly-built fellow, with short-cropped, 
wavy, chestnut hair and fine brown eyes. He 
also possessed a smile that was peculiarly win- 
ning. 

“Hello, you strangers ! I thought you ’d be 
out this afternoon. Is n’t it ripping weather?” 
he greeted them. “Where ’s Dave?” 

“He ’s gone to Bridgeton with Father,” an- 
swered Sue, “but where have you been all this 
time? Not sick, I hope?” 

The boy’s face clouded and he dug his shovel 
viciously into a snowbank. 

“No, not sick, but dilly-dallying around the 
54 


THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR” 

house, helping to wait on that old gentleman. 
They don’t seem to care how much time I 
lose.” 

It was the first time the girls had ever heard 
him speak so bitterly. 

“We heard that you had a visitor,” said 
Carol, striving hard to seem only politely in- 
terested. 

“Oh, we have a visitor, all right, but I ’m 
blest if I know why he ’s taken up his abode 
with us, nor even who he is, for that matter.” 

At this rather astonishing statement both 
girls looked somewhat startled. 

“I know it sounds queer to say it,” went on 
the boy, “and I ’m not sure they ’d thank me 
for saying it, either, but it ’s the honest truth, 
and I ’ve got to say it to some one, or I ’ll ex- 
plode with indignation.” 

“But what do you call him, if you don’t know 
who he is is?” queried Sue. 

“Well, he says his name is Monsieur de Vau- 
bert, but I strongly doubt it. I found his 
handkerchief lying on a chair yesterday, and 
it had the initial F on it. Later I asked Aunt 
55 


PARADISE GREEN 


Yvonne what his first name was, and she said 
‘Philippe.’ So can you figure out where F 
comes in? I can’t. 

“All that Aunt and Uncle will tell me about 
him,” he went on, “is that he is a descendant 
of an old friend of my father’s family in 
France; that he has always been much inter- 
ested in me and has come over here to visit 
and make my acquaintance. It sounds all 
right as far as it goes, but I ’m morally certain 
that that is n’t the whole of it. They treat him 
as if he were some sort of high mogul, and he 
treats them in the most politely condescending 
manner you ever saw. But the way he acts 
toward me is a caution. In some ways you ’d 
think I was the Grand Lama of Tibet, and 
that he was my most humble slave. Then at 
other times he gets so dictatorial about my 
studies and work and the way I spend my time 
that I just have to hold on to something to 
prevent going up in the air. I confess that 
I don’t know what he ’s driving at, and I could 
chew his head off sometimes, I get so mad. 
And yet in other w r ays he ’s a fine old chap, 
56 


THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR 


and I can’t help but admire him. Here he 
comes now. He said he would come out a few 
moments this afternoon.” 

They all looked across the Green as he spoke, 
to see the figure of an elderly gentleman, very 
much muffled up in a fur coat, slowly pacing 
down the walk. He seemed about seventy- 
five years of age, and he walked with a visible 
stoop, his hands clasped behind his back, his 
head bent slightly forward. His eyes were 
black and piercing, and his hair and mustache 
were almost white. His nose was sharp and 
eagle-like, and his whole appearance was very 
distinguished and foreign. Both Sue and 
Carol were decidedly impressed. 

“Well,” added Louis, “I must go back and 
be polite, I suppose, and also shovel my walk. 
By the way, I ’ll be over at your house. Sue, 
to-morrow evening, if it ’s convenient, and get 
some idea from you girls of what I ’ve been 
missing at high school all this week. Tell 
Dave I ’ll spend an hour or two with him after- 
ward. So long!” 

After he had left them the girls went on 
57 


PARADISE GREEN 

with their shoveling, but they could not, for 
the life of them, keep from gazing occasionally 
across at the mysterious stranger on the other 
side of the Green. They saw Louis return and 
speak to him for several moments, pacing along 
at his side, and later he left him to commence 
a vigorous attack on an unshoveled path. 

Then they saw a curious thing. Monsieur 
de Vaubert, stopping short in his pacing, 
stared almost aghast at Louis. Next, striding 
up to him and snatching the shovel from his 
hand, he spoke loudly and rapidly in French, 
as if in remonstrance. They heard Louis ex- 
postulating in the same language and exhibit- 
ing every sign of disagreement and dismay. 
At length he shrugged his shoulders hopelessly 
and turned to go into the house, leaving Mon- 
sieur to continue his pacing alone. 

“Well!” exclaimed Carol. “What on earth 
do you make of that?” 

“It looks very much as if ‘Monsieur’ did n’t 
approve of Louis’s snow-shoveling,” com- 
mented Sue, wonderingly. “But why? Do 
you know, I believe he thinks Louis is delicate 
58 


THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR” 


and ought n’t to exert himself. What a crazy 
idea ! Louis is really as strong as an ox, even 
if he is slender. He can throw Dave at wres- 
tling every time, even if he is lighter in weight. 
I can imagine how furious it must make Louis 
to be coddled that way.” 

They went on digging industriously. Sud- 
denly Carol whispered to Sue : 

“For pity’s sake, look at that!” 

It was the Imp, who had evidently walked 
up from the village and was just passing 
Louis’s house. On beholding the visitor still 
pacing up and down the walk in the sunlight, 
she had called out, “Bon jour. Monsieur !” 
She had been answered by the most courtly of 
bows, and “Bon jour, petite Mademoiselle 
Helene” Then she passed on, turning the 
corner of the Green toward her own house. 

The two girls stared at each other, speech- 
less. 

“Will you tell me how under the sun she 
came to know him?” gasped Sue, indignantly. 
“And she never has said a single word to us 
about it!” 


59 


PARADISE GREEN 


“Don’t ask me,” returned Carol. “Find out 
from her, if you can. She ’s the most exas- 
perating mortal I ever came across.” 

The Imp came on gaily, waving to them as 
affably as if she were quite unaware of the 
shock she had just given them. They did not 
acknowledge her salute, — a mistake they were 
sorry for later. 

“How long is it since you became acquainted 
with ‘Monsieur’?” demanded Sue, as soon as 
she had joined them. She did not try to keep 
annoyance out of her voice. 

“Oh, a whole twenty-four hours has elapsed 
since the event!” grinned the Imp, more imp- 
ishly than usual. “Did n’t I tell you?” 

“You know perfectly well that you did n’t!” 
cried Sue. 

“Well, I ’m sorry, — since it seems to worry 
you so much. Louis introduced us yesterday 
afternoon. We met just outside of Louis’ 
gate. Monsieur was taking the air just be- 
fore the snow began, and, as it happened, so 
was I. You two might have been, also, if you 
had n’t felt so lazy and hung about the fire in- 
60 


THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR” 


doors.” As usual, she had hit them on the raw. 
They might have known it ! 

“I think he is quite charming,” went on the 
Imp amiably. “We had a long talk. He 
praised my French accent, and says that he 
prefers to call me ‘Mademoiselle Helene,’ in- 
stead of ‘Bobs’ or ‘Bobbie’ or even ‘Roberta.’ 
He asked me a lot of questions about this place 
and the village and all that, and finally he told 
me why he came here.” 

“He did?” gasped the two girls. “What 
was the reason?” At that moment they could 
have hugged her for seeming so communica- 
tive. 

“I ’ll tell you,” she answered with danger- 
ous sweetness. “Pie came over to see Louis!” 
Their faces fell, but they tried hard not to show 
their indignation. 

“Of course,” agreed Sue, “but why did he 
come over here to see Louis? That ’s the 
question.” 

“If I told you that , I would n’t have any in- 
teresting secret of my own,” answered the Imp 
loftily. 


61 


PARADISE GREEN 


Then, feeling her revenge complete, she sped 
away into the house, leaving the puzzled and 
indignant pair behind her. 

January 20, 1914. Louis told us the 
strangest thing to-night. I must write about 
it before I go to bed. It makes this mystery 
about the queer old gentleman at his house 
deeper and deeper. He came over (Louis, I 
mean) to our house to-night, as he said he 
would yesterday. But he seemed perfectly 
furious about something, and instead of want- 
ing to study, he said he ’d just have to tell us 
what had happened, or burst. Fortunately, 
Carol and I were alone. If the Imp had been 
around, I just could n’t have stood having her 
hear everything that we did. She knows too 
much already, — sometimes I think a great deal 
more than we do, — about all this, and I ’m glad 
to get ahead of her on something. Anyhow, 
this is what Louis told us : 

“This morning was the limit,” he began. 
“I thought I ’d take a spell at working on that 
little motor-boat I ’m building in the old feed- 
62 


THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR” 

room at the back of the barn. I have n’t done 
much at it lately, because the weather ’s been 
so cold. But to-day was mild, and I thought 
I could make a lot of progress. You know 
I ’ve saved up enough of my pocket-money for 
the engine, and I ’m going to send for it next 
month. Well, what must Monsieur do, but 
trail out to the barn after me. I could n’t very 
well prevent him, so I let him come along, but 
I didn’t explain what I was doing there till 
we got into the room. 

“And, if you ’ll believe it, no sooner did he 
lay eyes on that cedar hull, and realize that it 
was my work, than he flew into a towering pas- 
sion. He stamped around the room, mutter- 
ing a lot of things in French that even I 
could n’t understand, though I caught the ex- 
pression, ‘The blood of that mechanic — al- 
ways — always !* repeated several times. I was 
simply speechless with astonishment, and just 
stood staring at him open-mouthed. 

“All of a sudden he raised his cane and hit 
the boat a horrible whack right on the gun- 
wale. It made a dent that I don’t suppose 
63 


PARADISE GREEN 

any amount of tinkering or painting will ever 
remove. Then I ‘saw red/ as they say. The 
idea of his presuming to do such a beastly 
thing! I just rushed at him, tore the cane 
from his hand, and threw it straight through 
the window. It smashed the glass and sash 
and everything. And I shouted, ‘How dare 
you! How dare you!’ I guess I was really 
too furious to think what I was doing. But 
it had the strangest effect on Monsieur. 

“He stopped suddenly, and his face, from 
being a brick-red with anger, went perfectly 
white. He drew himself up in a sort of mili- 
tary way, as stiff as a poker, and then bowed 
very low and made a military salute. ‘I beg 
a thousand pardons. Monsieur. I am deeply 
sorry !’ he said. I asked him what in the world 
he meant, anyway, but he only kept repeating 
that he was ‘deeply humiliated at his fit of 
temper/ and begged me to think no more of it. 
Then I asked him if he did n’t approve of my 
making the boat, and he said, ‘No; that I was 
cut out for something better than that labor- 
er’s work.’ 


(54 


THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR” 


“That remark made me madder than ever, 
and I asked him if it was not a good piece of 
work, and ought n’t any one to be proud of 
doing a thing like that so well. He only re- 
plied that I had far other things to be proud 
of, but I noticed that he did n’t say what. So 
I just faced him. 

“ ‘Look here,’ I said. ‘Just tell me one 
thing, like a man, won’t you? What are you 
here for, anyway? Am I the descendant of 
some duke or marquis or that sort of thing, 
and are you here to try to get me to go back 
to France and be one myself?’ You see, what 
Carol said the other day sort of stuck in my 
crop, and that boat business rather confirmed 
it. I went on to say to him, ‘Because if that ’s 
so, you need n’t bother. I won’t go !’ 

“He did n’t say a word for a minute or two. 
He just stood staring at me as if he ’d never 
seen me before. Then he said, very quietly: 

“ ‘No, Monsieur. You are quite mistaken. 
It is something vastly different, and I cannot 
explain it now. You must be content to wait. 
But, be assured, it will both astonish and de- 
6B 


PARADISE GREEN 

light you when it is disclosed.’ And with that 
he walked off and took to his bed again, I 
guess, for I have n’t seen him since. But I ’ve 
been ‘hot under the collar’ ever since at the 
damage he did to my boat.” 

“Well, all that is mighty strange,” I said, 
another idea suddenly dawning on me. “He 
does n’t seem to want you to do any work. 
Was that why he objected to you shoveling 
snow yesterday?” 

“The very thing,” replied Louis. “I was 
astonished when he said to me, ‘Where is that 
Meadows and his servant? Why are you re- 
quired to do this menial work?’ I tried to 
explain to him that I liked it and was doing it 
for exercise, but he simply couldn’t under- 
stand. He kept exclaiming, ‘It is not fitting!’ 
till I got so disgusted that I gave it up. If 
this sort of thing keeps up, I ’ll run away to 
sea or do something desperate. I declare I 
will!” 

“Are you glad, Louis, that you ’re not a duke 
or a marquis or anything like that?” I asked. 
“I should think you ’d have thought it fine.” 

66 


THE MYSTERIOUS “MONSIEUR” 

“I ’d simply detest it, Sue,” he answered. 
“I don’t want to be anything but an American 
citizen — ever ! But if this mystery business 
does n’t clear up soon, I ’ll be a raving luna- 
tic.” 

Well, I ’m disappointed myself to have 
Carol’s nice theory all knocked to pieces, for 
it would have been so romantic and unusual. 
But if it is n’t that, what on earth can it be? 

And how much does that wretched little Imp 
know? 


67 


CHAPTER V 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTEEY 

F EBRUARY 17. I ’m writing this under 
a good deal of difficulty, for my left hand 
is in a sling and this blank -book slips around 
dreadfully. The truth is that I had quite an 
accident the other day, and have been laid up 
ever since. It was the day after I last wrote 
in my journal. We ’d had a heavy fall of 
snow overnight, followed by a hard frost. 
The coasting on Eastward Hill was gorgeous, 
and we spent the whole of the next afternoon 
there. Just at the last the Imp suggested 
that we try the slide down the north slope of 
the hill. It ’s ever so much steeper than the 
one we usually take, and is considered rather 
dangerous. 

Louis said we ’d better not, but the Imp 
begged so hard that we agreed to try it just 
once. So Louis took Carol on his bobsled, and 
68 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 

the Imp and I had the other. She was steer- 
ing, because she ’s awfully good at that. They 
went first, and we followed. Everything went 
finely at the start. It ’s the most exciting 
thing going down that steep slide, and I was 
just enjoying it when suddenly something went 
wrong. I ’m not sure yet just what it was, but 
the Imp says there must have been a buried 
branch or something under one of our runners. 

Anyhow, the first I knew I was lying with 
my head in a snowbank and my left arm 
doubled under me in the queerest manner. 
The Imp had been landed in the bank, too, but 
she wasn’t a bit hurt and was up in a jiffy, 
dragging me out. First I thought I was all 
right, but when I stood up my left arm began 
to hurt me so that I thought I ’d die with the 
pain of it. They put me on one of the sleds 
and hustled me home in a hurry, and Louis 
went for the doctor. 

He said it was only a sprain, but that I must 
stay in the house for a while and take good care 
of it. So here I ’ve been ever since. The Imp 
has been an angel. That sounds funny, but I 
69 


PARADISE GREEN 


mean it! She nearly died of remorse at hav- 
ing been the cause of my accident, and she 
can’t do enough for me. She waits on me hand 
and foot, and has n’t teased or been a bit exas- 
perating once. To show how angelic she can 
be, I must write what she told me yesterday. 
She came in from a walk to the village, where 
she ’d been to get me some grapefruit, and an- 
nounced : 

“What do you think? I walked back most 
of the way with Monsieur. His things have 
come.” 

“What things?” I asked, astonished, for I 
knew that his trunks came the day after he 
arrived. 

“Oh, didn’t you know? A few things he 
brought with him. Two or three pictures and 
a big lot of books.” 

“But what did he bring over things like that 
for?” I demanded. “If he’s only here for 
a visit, it ’s rather queer for him to be cart- 
ing books and pictures about with him. I 
should n’t think he ’d be staying long enough 
to make it worth while.” 

70 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 

“I think he ’s going to stay quite a long 
while,” the Imp replied. “Perhaps it will be 
a year or more, judging from what he says.” 

“How do you know all this?” I asked. It 
aroused all the old, jealous feeling again to 
think that she knew so much more about it 
than I did. 

“Why, this way. You see, we were walk- 
ing up together, and we ’d got about as far as 
Louis’s gate when we both noticed a cart, with 
those things piled on it, standing there. Miss 
Yvonne was talking to the driver. Monsieur 
suddenly said, ‘Ah, my things have come! 
That is well !’ Then he turned to me and said, 
‘They are my most precious possessions. I 
never travel far without them.’ I said it was 
too bad that they ’d been delayed so long get- 
ting here from the steamer. For you know 
he ’s been here nearly a month. Then he said, 
‘They were not delayed, Mademoiselle Helene. 
I did not send for them at once because — I 
was not sure I should stay. Now I feel that 
my stay may be long.’ 

“Wasn’t that queer?” added the Imp. 

71 


PARADISE GREEN 


“Why do you suppose he first thought he 
might n’t stay long, and then decided that he 
would?” 

“Perhaps he likes it here better than he 
thought he would,” I suggested. 

“Nothing of the sort!” answered the Imp. 
“He hates it. He told me the climate was 
abominable. He did n’t see how any one could 
exist in it.” 

“Then it must be because he likes the Mead- 
ows’ and Louis so much,” I decided. 

“I don’t think that has anything to do w T ith 
it,” replied the Imp. “I ’m certain it ’s some- 
thing else. He ’s staying on because things 
have n’t gone the way he ’d planned. If they 
had, he ’d have gone right home. I ’ve figured 
that much out about him.” 

We did n’t have any more time for talk just 
then, for Mother came in to say that dinner 
was ready. But I ’ve been thinking and think- 
ing ever since about what the Imp told me. 
She was never so communicative with me be- 
fore. It ’s worth while to have a damaged 
arm, but I wonder how long it will last. I 
72 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 


wish Carol were over here right now, so that I 
could tell her. But she has a cold, and I 
have n’t seen her for two days. 

It has seemed rather curious to me, right 
along, that we young folks were the only ones 
who seemed interested in Louis’s affair and the 
new visitor. I wondered why. But some- 
thing that was said at table last night made me 
realize that we are, after all, the only ones who 
know much of the inside of that affair. For 
instance. Mother said to Father: 

“Who is that queer old gentleman visiting 
across the Green? He seems like a foreigner.” 

“Monsieur something-or-other,” Father an- 
swered. “I did n’t catch his name, though 
Louis tried to introduce us the other day, 
when they were passing where I was working 
in the north pasture. I ’ve never quite under- 
stood the Meadows’ household, anyway. They 
seem queer and foreign — all but Louis. He 
is a true American boy. I ’ve often wondered 
where John Meadows hailed from. He 
brought Louis here as a small baby, and I 
never knew where he came from. He would 
73 


PARADISE GREEN 


never say much about it. By the way, Simp- 
son wrote that we could have that new fertilizer 
next month.” 

And that ’s all they thought or cared about 
it. But, at any rate, their conversation had 
given me one bit of news — about Louis having 
been brought here as a little baby, and that 
folks did n’t know the Meadows’ people before. 
I ’d always supposed that they had lived here 
all along, too. I wonder if Louis knows this? 
I wonder if I had better tell him? I don’t 
know. Somehow that, and the news the Imp 
brought to-day, has made me feel about as 
mixed up as possible. I can’t make head or 
tail of anything. I wish Carol were here. 

I ’ve just been looking over this journal 
from the beginning, noticing all the queer 
things that have come up about Louis since I 
began it. I think I ’ll put them down in order 
and see if it will help me to make anything out 
of the strange situation. 

First, the queer way that Louis’s folks have 
always treated him and the fact that he is n’t 
any real relation. That looks to me very much 
74 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 

as if his antecedents or his forefathers or what- 
ever you call them must have been of some 
different station of life from the Meadows 
people. And yet Louis says their families 
have always been old friends. At any rate, 
they must feel, for some reason, responsible 
for him to some one, or they would n’t be so 
careful about him. By the way, that some one 
must be “Monsieur”; who else could it be? 

Next there were those mysterious cable- 
grams. Of course they were from “Mon- 
sieur,” but what did he mean by saying, “The 
time is ripe”? Sounds as if some sort of plot 
was being hatched. And then about those 
papers. What are they, and where are they? 
Have they anything to do with Louis ? I sup- 
pose they must. Does Louis himself know 
anything about them? He has never said a 
word to us. 

Besides, there was that queer performance 
when Miss Yvonne had Louis dig in the cellar 
at night. I ’m simply positive she must have 
been hunting for the papers then, and also on 
New Year’s Eve in the attic. I believe they 
75 


PARADISE GREEN 

must be documents to prove that Louis is to 
come into a great fortune, perhaps one that his 
ancestors left him. Yes, that ’s a brand new 
idea, and I ’m certain it ’ s nearer the truth than 
anything we ’ve thought of yet. “Monsieur” 
is probably the family lawyer in France, and 
has come to straighten everything out. Hur- 
rah! I do wish Carol was here, so that we 
could talk this over. It ’s a much more sen- 
sible idea than the one that Louis is the de- 
scendant of some titled person. It would 
explain a number of things, — why “Monsieur” 
does n’t like Louis to do any work, and that 
sort of thing. And probably, too, that ’s why 
they would like him to go back to France and 
be a statesman, since he can’t be a duke or a 
marquis and flourish around with the nobility. 
I suppose it ’s the next best thing, in their esti- 
mation. 

It might even explain, too, why “Monsieur” 
expects to make so long a stay here to get 
things all straightened out. Oh, I ’m so glad 
I thought of this! I can hardly wait for to- 
morrow to come, so that I can tell Carol. And 
76 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 

I believe 1 11 even tell the Imp, too. She ’s 
been so decent to me of late that I ’m willing 
to do ’most anything for her. 

“Ahoy, girls! Come over and see the big 
smash!” 

It was the Imp who thus hailed the two girls 
as they were coming home from the village one 
Saturday afternoon early in March. She was 
one of a group that was standing in Louis’s 
front yard, and the girls hurried over to see 
what it was all about. They found that a fine 
old cherry-tree had been half blown over by a 
high wind the night before, and now it threat- 
ened to fall at the slightest jar. Its fall would 
do serious damage to the fence near which it 
stood. Louis had decided to chop it down so 
that it would fall in the opposite direction. It 
was not the first time that he had had the expe- 
rience, and he rather enjoyed the thought of 
the task before him. It was quite evident, 
however, that “Monsieur” did not at all ap- 
prove of this scheme. He paced back and 
forth on the path, muttering impatiently to 
77 


PARADISE GREEN 


himself in French and occasionally urging 
Louis to be extremely careful. 

As this was the first time that either Sue or 
Carol had met “Monsieur,” Louis stopped long 
enough to make the introductions. Monsieur 
bowed formally and murmured that he was 
“charmed to meet mesdemoiselles,” but there 
his interest in them ended, and he continued to 
pace back and forth and mutter to himself. 

Once the Imp poked Sue and whispered : 

“He says, ‘Always, always this servant’s 
work !’ He ’s been having a fit about this ever 
since they came out. But Louis was deter- 
mined to get it done. Monsieur certainly does 
make him mad and nervous, though.” 

The tree was almost ready to topple over, 
when an unfortunate thing happened. It may 
have been that Louis was nervous, or that his 
foot slipped on a patch of ice, or that it was a 
combination of both. At any rate, just as the 
ax was raised for one of his most telling blows, 
he missed his aim and brought it down directly 
on his left foot. With a slight groan, he 
dropped to the ground. An instant later blood 
78 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 

began to pour from the wound in sickening 
spurts. So sudden had it all been, that his 
watchers hardly realized what had happened 
till the spouting blood revealed the accident. 

Immediately all was confusion. Monsieur 
uttered a cry that was almost a scream and, 
stooping down, tried to lift Louis in his arms. 
Miss Yvonne rushed out, wringing her hands 
and screaming, too, in her excitable French 
fashion. Old Mr. Meadows raised the parlor- 
window and stood calling out all sorts of im- 
possible directions, half in French and half in 
English. Carol turned as white as a sheet and 
looked as if she were going to faint away. She 
usually did at the sight of blood. Only the 
Imp seemed to have any sense left. She called 
out to Carol : 

“You run to our house and telephone for any 
doctor you can get, either in the village or at 
Bridgeton 1” 

Then she said to Monsieur : 

“Please let Louis alone. He ’ll bleed to 
death if you lift him that way.” 

Lastly she turned to Miss Yvonne: 

T9 


PARADISE GREEN 

“Don’t you think that between us we could 
manage to carry Louis into the house? I ’ll 
hold his poor foot so that it won’t bleed so 
much.” 

It was almost absurd to hear that small child 
giving everybody orders, but it was rather line, 
too. And somehow it restored them to their 
senses. Carol went flying off to telephone, 
only too glad to get away. Miss Yvonne 
stopped screaming and lifted Louis in her 
strong arms, while Sue held his head and Mon- 
sieur his uninjured foot. 

Louis had fainted by this time. The Imp 
held his injured foot in such a way that as little 
blood as possible escaped. Sue admitted later 
that she would scarcely have had the nerve to 
do it, even if she had been able. She was very 
much hampered, because her left arm was still 
in a sling, so that all she could do was to hold 
up the boy’s head with her right hand. 

Somehow or other they got Louis into the 
house. Monsieur insisted that they carry him 
up to his (Monsieur’s) room, though the 
others thought it would have been better to 
80 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 


take him to his own room on the ground floor. 
Rut Monsieur would have his way, and they 
got Louis there somehow. By the time they 
had laid him in the big brass bed, Carol came 
flying back to say that she could n’t reach a sin- 
gle doctor in town. Every one was out. But 
she had managed to get a promise from Dr. 
Langmaid in Bridgeton that he would come 
over directly in his car, as soon as he could 
leave a serious surgical case that he was treat- 
ing in his office. 

Meanwhile Louis’s foot was still bleeding 
horribly. Something had to be done at once. 
Miss Yvonne had got his shoe and stocking off 
and was bathing the horrid wound, but that 
did n’t help much. No one but Sue seemed to 
know how to stop the bleeding and she was 
practically helpless because of her hand. The 
reason she knew was because she had just fin- 
ished a course of “First Aid to the Injured” 
lectures that had been given to the Young 
Girls’ Club in school by a trained nurse. 
Carol did n’t take the course, because she hated 
all that kind of thing and it made her sick. 

81 


PARADISE GREEN 


But Sue had enjoyed it. One of the principal 
things she had learned was about the tourni- 
quet and bandaging. But how was she to do 
anything with only one hand? Suddenly the 
idea that she could give the Imp directions and 
let her do it dawned on Sue. The Imp was 
so quick that she would understand in a wink. 

So Sue asked Miss Yvonne if she ’d tear up 
a sheet for some bandages, and told the Imp 
that if she ’d do as she told her, she thought 
they could stop the bleeding. Miss Yvonne 
went right to work, and the Imp followed Sue’s 
directions well, while the latter did what she 
could with one hand. They used a buttonhook 
for a tourniquet, and in five minutes Louis’s 
foot was bandaged roughly and not bleeding 
any more. Monsieur had been spending the 
time in bathing Louis’s head and holding am- 
monia to his nose. Presently Louis came to 
and tried to ask what was the matter. But 
they made him stop talking, because he was so 
weak from loss of blood. 

After that there was n’t anything to do but 
82 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 

wait for the doctor, so they sat around the 
room, not talking and all looking nervous and 
embarrassed. 

At last Dr. Langmaid arrived. He came 
jumping upstairs two steps at a time. After 
he had taken one look at Louis’s foot, he said: 

“Whoever did that bandaging had good com- 
mon sense. Perhaps it saved his life.” 

That was all, but it made Sue feel proud for 
the Imp. The Imp, however, declared that it 
was Sue’s work, for she would never have 
known how to do it herself. At any rate, after 
that the doctor turned out every one but Miss 
Yvonne, and they stayed there with Louis for 
an age, while all the rest waited downstairs for 
news. At last the doctor came down and told 
them that Louis had almost severed an artery, 
but that he had broken no bones. He sewed 
up the wound and left directions that Louis 
was to stay in bed for some time and have care- 
ful attention, lest blood-poisoning set in. But 
he said it was a miracle that nothing worse had 
happened, and left his compliments for the two 


PARADISE GREEN 

young ladies who did the bandaging. At 
which the Imp and Sue pinched each other 
and took their departure. 

It was after they had left the house and were 
walking across the Green to their own home, 
their knees still shaking with the excitement 
they had experienced, that the Imp remarked : 

“Did you see the queer thing that hung on 
‘Monsieur’s’ wall, right opposite to the bed?” 

“Why, no,” answered Sue. “That is, I 
suppose I did, but I was so nervous and wor- 
ried that I can’t remember anything about it. 
I hardly took my eyes from Louis. What was 
it, anyw r ay?” 

“Three pictures, but the only one that I 
could see was the middle one. It was a life- 
sized picture of a little boy about six or seven, 
I should think. He had big brown eyes and 
browm wavy hair, and was quite a pretty little 
chap, but he was dressed awfully queerly. I 
guess the picture must be quite old, for his 
clothes were n’t like anything that ’s been worn 
for years. I wonder why ‘Monsieur’ carts it 
around and has it hanging there. Must be 
84 


TWO ACCIDENTS AND A MYSTERY 

some relation, I suppose, or some child of 
whom he was very fond.” 

“But I thought you said his clothes were 
so queer and old-timey,” suggested Sue. “I 
imagined from the way you spoke that they 
must be of a fashion more than a hundred years 
old.” 

“I guess they were, too,” admitted the Imp. 
“I had thought that perhaps the boy was a son 
or a brother, but I guess he was from way be- 
fore that time.” 

“Must be some famous ancestor, then,” said 
Sue. “By the way, what did you mean by 
saying that the boy’s picture was the only one 
you could see? If the three pictures were all 
hanging on the wall at the foot of the bed, you 
could see the other two just as well, I should 
think.” 

“No, I couldn’t; and for a very queer rea- 
son,” replied the Imp darkly. 

“Oh, for gracious sake, don’t begin to tease!” 
cried Sue impatiently, suspecting that the Imp 
was up to one of her usual tricks. “Things 
have been so exciting, and you ’ve been such a 
85 


PARADISE GREEN 


dear, that I hate to have you spoil it by begin- 
ning that ‘mysterious’ business.” 

“But it was mysterious,” argued the Imp, 
“and you ’d have seen it for yourself, if you ’d 
only had your eyes about you.” 

“Well, what was it?” sighed Sue. “I ’m 
afraid you ’re making a whole lot out of noth- 
ing.” 

“I ’m not F cried the Imp. “And I ’ll 
prove it this minute. I could n't see those two 
other pictures because — they both had a heavy, 
dark silk covering of some kind stretched com- 
pletely over them, frames and all! Now will 
you believe me?” 

At this curious bit of information even 
doubting Sue had to admit that the Imp was 
right. 


86 


CHAPTER VI 
in monsieur’s room 

M ARCH 8, 1914. I thought the last en- 
tries in this journal were pretty excit- 
ing, with two accidents to tell about, but they 
were just nothing to what ’s been happening 
since. My arm is all right again; no trouble 
at all, except for a slight stiffness. So that ’s 
all about that. But Louis! 

For the first two days after his accident he 
seemed to be doing nicely. None of us saw 
him, for the doctor had ordered that he be kept 
very quiet. When we went to inquire, Miss 
Yvonne said he was better and in no pain, and 
that he wanted to see us all, but that he must 
be quiet for a while. Then, on the third day, 
her face was very grave. 

“He has fever,” she said. “It is not high, 
87 


PARADISE GREEN 


but the doctor is not pleased. Louis is rest- 
less, and his foot is swollen. We are all anx- 
ious about him.” 

I repeated her w r ords to Father, and he said: 

“Poor boy! Blood-poisoning, probably. 
I ’m sorry for him. Was that ax very rusty ?” 

I replied that it was, for I remember that 
Louis remarked about it at the time and said 
he could do better work if the ax was cleaned 
and was sharper. Father shook his head and 
said they ’d have to keep a careful watch on 
him now. 

Next day matters became worse. From 
then till this evening we have been frightfully 
anxious, and the Meadows’ family and Mon- 
sieur grew almost frantic. It was blood- 
poisoning, and the doctor said it was so bad 
that he doubted if he could save Louis’s foot. 
At that, Monsieur sent post-haste to the city 
for a famous surgeon, and after days of work- 
ing over him Louis is to-night pronounced out 
of danger. When I went over this evening to 
get the news, Miss Yvonne cried when she told 
me. I cried, too, and I saw Monsieur coming 


IN MONSIEUR’S ROOM 

downstairs, his eyes suspiciously moist. What 
a relief ! 

They have had two trained nurses, and one 
of them will stay till Louis is much stronger. 
Miss Yvonne is quite worn out with work and 
worry, and she looks like a shadow of herself. 
Old Mr. Meadows appears to have grown ten 
years older in a week, and seems very feeble. 
As for Monsieur, in the few glimpses I ’ve had 
of him he looks as if he had n’t had a wink of 
sleep for four days. As a matter of fact, I 
heard that he had n’t gone to bed and slept 
since Louis became so ill, — just napped while 
sitting in a chair. 

I have n’t slept well myself, and neither has 
Carol. Even the Imp has been very much 
concerned. She continues to be awfully decent 
to us, but I wonder how much longer it will 
last. Not long, I ’m pretty sure, after Louis 
is well again. I know her too thoroughly to 
be deceived into thinking she has turned over a 
new leaf for good! 

Now for bed and a long, peaceful sleep for 
the first time in a week ! 

89 


PARADISE GREEN 


March 18. To-day, for the first time, I 
have seen Louis. He was much better, and 
he wanted to see us so much that Miss Yvonne 
sent over the servant to tell us that we three 
could come over (Dave had gone yesterday), 
but that we all had better not see him at once. 
Carol and the Imp and I went over. One by 
one we were allowed to go up to the room. 
But we were warned that no one must stay 
more than five minutes, and that we must n’t 
talk to Louis about anything exciting. 

Carol went first, but she did n’t stay any- 
where near her five minutes, for I timed her 
by the parlor clock. It seemed as if she had 
scarcely had time to go up and walk into the 
room before she must have walked out again. 
She came down looking awfully solemn and 
scared, and whispered : 

“He looks awful, — as if he ’d been so sick ! 
I was frightened. The trained nurse was 
there, and Monsieur, too. I did n’t know 
what on earth to say, so I did n’t stay but a 
minute.” 

Then the Imp went up, and I guess she was 
90 


IN MONSIEUR’S ROOM 

more successful, for she stayed two minutes 
over her time. We heard her say, “Hello, old 
sport!” as she entered the room, and we even 
heard a sound like Louis’s laugh. Then there 
was a great chattering in French, and I knew 
that she and Monsieur were talking together. 
When she came down she said that Monsieur 
had been thanking her for what she did on the 
day of the accident, and that she had been try- 
ing to convince him she had n’t done anything, 
except to obey my directions. He would n’t 
stand for that, however, and insisted that she 
had been the means of saving Louis’s life. 
Nothing she could say would persuade him 
differently. 

Then it came my turn, and I went up with 
my knees shaking, like the silly goose I am, 
for there was nothing on earth to be afraid of. 
But somehow it always did seem a solemn thing 
to me to see a person for the first time after 
he has been so near to death. But they 
shook worse when I got into the room and saw 
how really awful Louis looked. He is like a 
thin shadow of his former self, and so white 
91 


PARADISE GREEN 


and hollow-eyed. He ’s never been sick be- 
fore, to any extent, so I never dreamed he 
could look like that. 

I murmured something or other to Louis, — 
I can’t remember what, — and then Monsieur 
began to thank me in very elaborate and for- 
mal English for what I had done on the day 
of the accident. I tried to answer that it 
wasn’t anything, and I could easily see that 
he did n’t think it was so much, compared to 
what the Imp had done. But Louis spoke up 
in the weakest voice, and declared : 

“Sue is a trump! I know what she did, for 
I was n’t unconscious all of the time. Be- 
tween them they patched me up beautifully.” 

But Monsieur was n’t much impressed. 
It ’s plain to be seen that the Imp is his favor- 
ite. I don’t care a scrap, however, since Louis 
said what he did ! 

Well, I could n’t think of another thing to 
say, so I bade Louis good-bye and took my de- 
parture. But before I left the room I snatched 
a good long look at those pictures. I ’ve been 
thinking of them constantly, ever since that 


IN MONSIEUR’S ROOM 

first day, and longing to see them. It cer- 
tainly was queer to see those two so tightly 
covered. There ’s something about the one of 
the boy that haunts me, though. I don’t know 
why. Carol and I have talked it over and 
over, and we can’t make it out. The trouble 
is that she practically hasn’t seen it at all. 
That day of the accident she did n’t come into 
the room, for she was telephoning the doctor. 
She did n’t want to come in, anyway, because 
she knew she could n’t stand it. And to-day 
she only caught the smallest glimpse of it, be- 
cause she was so upset when she came out of 
the room. 

The nurse says that next time we go to see 
Louis we can probably stay a little longer, if 
he continues to improve. 

March 15. We all went in again to-day. 
Monsieur was not there, to Carol’s and my 
great relief, but the nurse was. I warned 
Carol beforehand to take a good look at the 
portrait this time, and she did. She says she 
feels as I do about it, as if she ’d seen it, or 
93 


PARADISE GREEN 


some one like it, somewhere before. And yet 
she ’s sure she has n’t, really. I don’t under- 
stand it. 

Louis is beginning to make all sorts of plans 
about what he will do when he ’s well again. 
He ’s wild at having to be away from school 
and lose so much time, but we Ve promised to 
keep all our notes for him, and that will help 
a lot when he goes back. 

The Imp has returned to her old tricks 
again. I knew she would when the excitement 
was over. She told me that she met Monsieur 
on her way to school this morning, and that 
she walked all the way to the village with him. 
He was going down to get some medicine for 
Louis. But she startled me to pieces when she 
added : 

“I asked him who that nice little boy was 
whose picture he had in his room. He said 
he ’d tell me if I ’d promise to keep it a secret. 
I said that I certainly would, cross my heart.” 

“So he told you?” I asked, trying not to act 
as if I cared a bit. 

“Why, certainly,” the Imp answered, with 
94 


IN MONSIEUR’S ROOM 

that wicked gleam in her eye. “He did as he 
said he would. I ’d be glad to tell you, but, of 
course, I ’ve promised not to.” 

“Did you ask him why he kept the other two 
pictures covered?” I inquired. 

“Yes, I asked him that, too, but he said it 
was for a reason he could n’t explain at pres- 
ent.” 

The Imp would n’t have told me if he had 
explained. I ’m positive of that. And 
what ’s more, I simply can’t believe that he 
told her all about the other one. She can 
make things sound so mysterious, when there ’s 
really nothing to them at all. However, I 
can’t be certain, even of this. Maybe he really 
did explain, though why he should make her 
promise not to tell is a puzzle. 

I ’m not going to think about it any more 
just now. It makes me too furious. 

March 22. Such a strange, strange thing 
happened to-day. Dave went with me to see 
Louis this afternoon, for the Imp had to go on 
an errand to the village, and Carol was in the 
95 


PARADISE GREEN 


house with another severe cold. Dave went up 
first, stayed quite a while, and then went on 
home. 

Miss Yvonne took me up and told me that 
the nurse was out for the afternoon, and that 
Monsieur was lying down in Louis’s room. 
So, for the first time since his accident, I ac- 
tually saw Louis without a lot of other people 
in the room. We chatted for a while about 
school matters and what we had all been doing 
while he was laid up. And Louis told me how 
much better he was, how he was soon going to 
be allowed to get up, and that the nurse was 
going in a few days. After that we were both 
quiet for a few moments. It was one of those 
pauses that sometimes come in conversation, 
which get so prolonged that you hardly know 
how to break them. Then, just to end the 
silence, I asked Louis why Monsieur had in- 
sisted on his being in this room, and how incon- 
venient it must have been for Monsieur. To 
my surprise, Louis became much excited and 
said: 

“I can’t think whatever made him do it that 


IN MONSIEUR’S ROOM 


day ! I did n’t want to be here. I ’m horribly 
uncomfortable about it all the time. I hate it! 
It would have been so much more sensible to 
have put me in my own room on the ground 
floor. And, Sue, what do you think?” Here 
Louis sank his voice to a whisper. “I came to 
myself one day, out of a sort of stupor that 
I ’d been in, and found him kneeling by the 
side of the bed and actually kissing my hand! 
I was so astonished and disgusted that I 
snatched it away, weak as I was. He never 
said a word, but rose and walked out of the 
room. What does it all mean?” 

“I ’m sure I don’t know, Louis,” I replied; 
“but tell me, do you know anything about those 
portraits that hang on the wall opposite your 
bed? Why are two covered up, and who is 
that boy in the middle?” 

To my astonishment, Louis seized hold of 
my arm and whispered : 

“Sue, Sue, I hate those pictures. I hate 
that one in the middle. I ’m afraid of it! 
I—” 

Before he could say any more we heard Miss 
97 


PARADISE GREEN 

Yvonne coming up the stairs to tell me that 
my time was up and that Louis must rest. 
And so he could n’t go on. 

But why, *why does Louis hate the picture of 
that boy, and why, above all things, is he afraid 
of it? Was there ever so curious a mystery? 


98 


CHAPTER VII 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

D ESPITE the fact that Sue and Carol 
boiled with impatience for over a week, 
conjecturing what it could possibly be that 
made Louis afraid of the picture in Monsieur’s 
room, they found out nothing new on the sub- 
ject, for the simple reason that there was never 
a moment when they again saw him alone. To 
ask him about it when others were in the room 
was impossible. Two days after Sue’s last 
visit he was allowed to sit up, and a day or two 
after that he was permitted to walk about for a 
few steps. Then the nurse took her leave, and 
Louis insisted on returning to his own room on 
the ground floor. 

“And only to think,” sighed Sue, when she 
heard of it, “now we’ll probably never see 
those strange pictures on Monsieur’s wall 
99 


PARADISE GREEN 


again. I could cry with vexation when I think 
of it. Carol, do you feel as if there were some- 
thing terribly mysterious about them, — not 
only the two covered ones, but the boy’s, also? 
I wonder if it haunts you the same as it does 
me?” 

“It certainly does,” admitted Carol, “and 
yesterday I wrote a little poem about it. 
Here it is. What do you think of it?” 

She handed Sue a scrap of paper on which 
the verses were written. The two girls had 
dropped off the trolley on their way home from 
high school, and were bound for the library. 
Sue took the paper and studied it carefully as 
she walked. 

“I like it a lot,” she acknowledged, as she 
handed it back. “Especially those last two 
lines : 

*0 boy of nut-brown hair and smiling eyes, 

Speak out and tell the secret that you know/ 


Really, it ’s awfully pretty and the best thing 
you ’ve done yet. Why don’t you show it to 
100 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

Miss Cullingford. It has n’t any direct refer- 
ence to Louis’s affairs in it, and I ’ll warrant 
she ’d recommend it to be published in our high 
school paper, The Argus ” 

“Well, perhaps I will,” agreed Carol, visibly 
pleased with Sue’s unstinted praise. She 
folded the paper back into a book as they went 
up the steps of the library. 

It was while the two were wandering round 
the big, sunny room, scanning the shelves for 
an interesting book, that they made a startling 
discovery. 

“Will you look at that!” wdiispered Carol, 
suddenly pinching Sue as they were passing 
the door of the smaller reference room, a spot 
they themselves seldom entered. There, near 
a shelf of immense volumes, stood — who but 
the Imp! She was deeply engrossed in the 
pages of a tome nearly as large as herself. 
The sight was the more amazing because the 
Imp was neither a member of the library, so 
far as they knew, nor did she ever enter it, if 
she could help it, except rarely to get a book 
for the girls. 


101 


PARADISE GREEN 


The two stood rooted to the spot with aston- 
ishment. Suddenly the Imp caught sight of 
them. She promptly closed the book and 
slipped it back on the shelf. All she would 
admit in reply to what she felt to be their 
intrusive inquiries was the statement: 

“I ’m looking up something on the advice of 
Miss Hastings. I guess I don’t have to ex- 
plain everything to you.” After which re- 
mark she marched majestically out of the room. 

The girls tried to guess from the shelf where 
she had stood what book she had been consult- 
ing, but as it was a long row of encyclopedias, 
all exactly alike, they could not glean the least 
inkling. Giving up that course, they ques- 
tioned the librarian on the way out, and found 
that the Imp had joined the library several 
days before. 

“Did you ever know anything to beat it?” 
demanded Sue, as they passed down the steps. 
“What can she be up to? I know she ’s aw- 
fully bright and reads lots of books that inter- 
est grown-folks, but she ’s so lazy about things 
and so crazy just to be outdoors that she never 
102 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 


thought it worth while to join the library be- 
fore.” 

“She said,” Carol reminded her, “that her 
teacher, Miss Hastings, advised her to look up 
something. You know she always tells the 
truth, at least.” 

“That ’s true,” admitted Sue, “but it must 
be something out of the ordinary, or she would 
simply have come to us and bribed us to go and 
do it for her. And besides, in her class they 
don’t have to look up things in encyclopedias ; 
they haven’t got to that yet. No, I’m cer- 
tain it ’s something else.” 

Wondering about the Imp’s strange behav- 
ior, they harked back, as they walked home- 
ward, to that other subject that was constantly 
puzzling them. 

“Do you know,” said Carol, “I believe that 
I ’ve come to agree with you in your theory 
about Louis and Monsieur. You know I 
did n’t when you first told me, because I was 
awfully disappointed about his not being a 
count or a duke. But now I think that you ’re 
right. Monsieur is probably the family law- 
103 


PARADISE GREEN 


yer, and Louis is going to inherit a big French 
fortune. But if that is the case, why is it that 
Monsieur seems to be trying so hard to make 
Louis like him? You remember, Louis said 
the other day that he constantly feels as if Mon- 
sieur were doing everything in his power to win 
his affection, for some reason or other. If he 
were only a family lawyer, he would n’t care a 
penny whether Louis liked him or not. And 
why was he kissing his hand the other day ? 
I ’m half -inclined to believe that he ’s some rel- 
ative — a grandfather or an uncle or something. 
Yet he could scarcely be that, and the lawyer, 
too. Is n’t it a puzzle?” 

“But don’t you remember that Miss Yvonne 
told Louis he wasn’t any relative?” Sue re- 
minded her; “only an old friend of the family.” 

“Susette,” remarked Carol solemnly, stop- 
ping stock still in the middle of the road, “you 
may call me all kinds of an idiot if you like, but 
I want to tell you one thing. I ’ve been feel- 
ing lately that there ’s some mystery here, big- 
ger than anything you or I imagine. It ’s just 
104 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 


a feeling I have, but it haunts me continually. 
I ’m certain something is going to happen that 
will make us gasp with astonishment. And 
when that does happen, I want you to remind 
me of what I ’ve said to-day. I ’m sure I ’m 
right. I feel it in my very bones, as Aunt 
Agatha often says.” 

And Sue, much impressed, as solemnly 
promised to remind her. 

March 27 There ’s something that the Imp 
is up to, — something that she has discovered. 
I *m as certain of it as I am that my name is 
Susette Birdsey. The reason I know this is 
because of what happened to-day. 

Carol and I had gone down this afternoon 
to Anita Brown’s to go over some English his- 
tory with her for an exam we ’re going to have 
in a day or two. Anita is great on history, and 
somehow can make it seem so simple and sensi- 
ble and easy to remember. I don’t know how 
she does it, but we always like to study that 
subject with her and get her to explain all 
105 


PARADISE GREEN 

about the succession of kings and what relation 
they were to each other. She has the knack of 
making them seem like real people. 

Well, we had stopped at her house on the 
way from high school, so we had n’t been home 
this afternoon. About half -past four we left, 
and happened to come out of her gate just a 
little behind two people who were walking up 
the road. (Anita lives about half-way be- 
tween our house and the village.) It didn’t 
take us an instant to recognize those two peo- 
ple as Monsieur and the Imp. Carol was all 
for hurrying along to join them, but I said no, 
we might just as well keep to ourselves, for 
they probably did n’t care for our company, 
anyway. So we kept on behind them, and 
they were talking so fast and hard that they 
did n’t even notice us. 

Presently the Imp did a queer thing. She 
opened her school-bag, took out a book — it 
was n’t a school-book, either ! — opened it at a 
certain page, and showed something to Mon- 
sieur. Whatever it was, it had the strangest 
effect on him. He gave one look at the page, 
106 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

then stopped stock still in the road and stared 
at the Imp, making a queer sound in his throat, 
as if he were trying to clear it and did n’t suc- 
ceed very well. Then he said something in 
French that we caught the sound of but 
couldn’t understand. But the Imp was evi- 
dently so excited that she forgot to speak 
French, for we heard her say in English : 

“Then I’m right, Monsieur? It’s the 
same? I was sure it was.” 

And he answered: 

“Oui, oui , petite mademoiselle !” (I know 
enough French to translate this as “Yes, yes.”) 

After that the Imp went right on to chatter 
in French. But by this time we ’d made up 
our minds that it was high time we were let in 
to that little secret, so we hurried to catch up 
with them. But the Imp saw us too quickly. 
She shut the book, slipped it back in her school- 
bag, and by the time we had joined them they 
were conversing sedately in English about the 
weather. 

When we reached our own gate the Imp 
went off about her own devices, with never a 
107 


PARADISE GREEN 


word about the queer performance on the 
street. But Carol and I made up our mind 
that we ’d take a peep at that book in her 
school-bag when she was n’t around. So when 
she had gone upstairs for a while, we opened 
the school-bag that she had flung down on the 
couch in the living-room. 

But when did we ever manage to get ahead 
of the Imp? She had carefully removed that 
hook, and it was nowhere to he found. I re- 
member noticing that it was a thick book with 
a light green cover, and there was nothing even 
faintly resembling it anywhere about, so far as 
we could discover. What she could have done 
with it, or when she could have taken it out 
without our notice, beats me. Leave it to the 
Imp, however, to accomplish that sort of trick. 

Of course we plainly saw that there was 
nothing we could do, except to question her, 
and we debated the longest time about whether 
to do so or not. It ’s such a hopeless perform- 
ance, if the Imp has made up her mind before- 
hand that you ’re not going to find out any- 
thing from her. Carol suggested that we ask 
108 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

her right out what she had discovered that 
Monsieur was so interested in. I told her 
there was only one kind of answer to expect to 
that, so what on earth was the use ? 

I thought I had a better scheme. The Imp 
has been wild for a long time to have a foun- 
tain-pen like the one I bought in Bridgeton two 
months ago for a dollar. I was going to save 
up and give her one for her birthday. But 
that ’s a long way off yet. So I suggested to 
Carol that I offer to let the Imp have mine, 
and then buy a new one with the dollar Uncle 
Ben gave me at Christmas. She said it was an 
awful waste of a good pen, and might not ac- 
complish what we wanted, anyway, but that I 
could try it if I liked. 

So a little later, when the Imp came in where 
we were studying, I began on the subject, but 
very carefully, so that she would n’t suspect 
something right at the start and spoil every- 
thing. After she had settled herself to read — 
it was my book, by the way ! — I began thus : 

“You and Monsieur seemed to be having a 
nice time while you were coming up the road 
109 


PARADISE GREEN 

this afternoon. Does he think you talk good 
French?” 

The Imp glanced at me warily, but replied 
in an amiable manner : 

“Oh, yes. He says I ’m the only person 
he ’s met in America, except Louis and his 
folks, who speaks it with a decent accent.” 

Then she went on reading. It was plain 
that she was n’t going to give us any opening, 
if she could help it. 

“Do you always talk to him in French?” I 
went on cautiously. 

“Yes, always. He likes it best,” she an- 
swered, without looking up again. 

“But we heard you say something to him in 
English this afternoon,” I ventured, for I had 
a scheme as to just how I was going to trap 
her. For a wonder, she fell into it. 

“I did n’t ! I don’t remember saying a word 
in English.” 

This was just what I had thought. She 
was so excited at the time that she had n’t re- 
membered. 

“Oh, but you did!” broke in Carol. “We 
110 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

heard you say: ‘Then I ’m right? It is the 
same? I was sure it was.’ ” 

‘You horrid things!” burst out the Imp. 
“Always tracking me around and eavesdrop- 
ping! You once accused me of that, but I 
think the tables are turned now.” 

“Look here,” I said, and I felt downright 
mad, “y° u know perfectly well we were n’t do- 
ing anything of the kind. We happened to 
come out of Anita’s house right behind you, 
and we refrained from joining you at first be- 
cause we knew you did n’t want us. We 
could n’t help it if you talked so loud that we 
could hear what you said.” 

She calmed down at that, and I seized the 
advantage and determined on a bold stroke. 

“Bobs dear,” I said, in as friendly a way 
as I could, “we know you ’ve discovered some- 
thing about Monsieur or Louis or some one 
from what you said and did this afternoon. 
Won’t you tell us about it, too? You know 
we ’re awfully interested. And just to show 
you that we only mean to be friendly, I ’ll give 
you that new fountain-pen of mine, if you care 
111 


PARADISE GREEN 

to have it. I don’t mean it as a bribe, but only 
to make you feel that we aren’t really hate- 
ful.” 

At this her eyes fairly sparkled for a mo- 
ment. Then she shook her head. 

“I can’t do it, girls, much as I ’m crazy to 
have that pen. Honest, I can’t. I ’m not 
teasing you about it this time, either. I really 
have discovered something quite important, 
and it just happened by accident, too. But 
Monsieur was so upset about it, and asked me 
so politely not to say anything to any one, that 
I just feel it would n’t be right. I think I took 
him terribly by surprise. I don’t know what 
it all means yet myself. There ’s something 
awfully mysterious about things over at 
Louis’s. And really, you ’ve been so decent to 
me lately that I ’d tell you if I could, even 
without the pen.” 

Well, that was too much for me. I knew 
she meant every word she said, and I could 
understand, too, why she felt she could n’t tell 
us. So I just gave her the pen, anyway, and 
she was so happy and grateful. She said: 

112 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 


“It ’s all right, girls. You 're trumps! 
And I ’ll do something for you yet, never you 
fear.” 

But only to think that it was the Imp who 
made the first real, important discovery about 
this mystery! Well, things do happen 
queerly. I wonder what in the world she can 
have discovered? 




113 


CHAPTER VIII 


THE PORTRAIT OF MYSTERY 

I T was well into April before Louis came 
back to school, looking a trifle thin and 
pale, but otherwise not impaired by his serious 
accident. Carol and Sue traveled back and 
forth with him on the trolley several times, but 
never once picked up courage to ask him the 
question, the answer to which they were burn- 
ing to know, — why had he been afraid of the 
strange portrait in Monsieur’s room? 

It was not till one evening when he had come 
over to see Dave that the subject was broached. 
Dave was detained out in the barn, helping his 
father with a sick farm-horse, and while they 
were waiting for him in the living-room the 
talk drifted to Monsieur and his devoted kind- 
ness during Louis’s illness. 

“He simply could n’t do enough for me,” the 

m 


THE PORTRAIT OF MYSTERY 


boy asserted. “Beginning with his insisting 
on my having his room, he loaded me with deli- 
cacies and attentions of every sort the whole 
time. I began by quite despising him, but 
he ’s been so jolly good to me that I ’ve just 
got to like him, whether or no ! Honestly, it ’s 
almost pathetic sometimes, he tries so hard. I 
feel like a brute if I don’t respond in just the 
way he wants me to. He ’s stopped talking 
about all the things he knows I don’t care for, 
and even stands for my talking about mechani- 
cal engineering and that sort of thing. And 
that ’s going some for him!” 

“Louis,” ventured Sue, a little timidly, “do 
you mind telling us now why you hated and 
were afraid of that portrait? You were going 
to tell me that day, if you remember, when we 
were interrupted.” 

The boy looked hesitant for a moment. 
Then he replied : 

“I believe I might as well. It can’t hurt 
any one that I can see. I ’ve had the most 
peculiar feeling about that picture ever since 
my accident. Before that I ’d seen it, of 
115 


PARADISE GREEN 


course, but had never thought much about it, 
and those two others that are covered I only 
thought were just another eccentricity of Mon- 
sieur’s. He ’s awfully eccentric, anyw r ay, 
about a number of things. But after I landed 
in that room with my chopped foot, and had to 
stay there when I did n’t want to and lie staring 
day and night at that picture at the foot of my 
bed, first I began to hate it and then I actually 
became afraid of it. You ’ll hardly believe me, 
gilds, when I tell you that I covered up my 
head with the bedclothes at times, when I was 
alone in the room, so that I would n’t have to 
look at it.” 

“But why?” interrupted Carol. “What was 
strange about it ?” 

“Well,” Louis answered, “it ’s not so much 
that there ’s anything strange about the picture 
itself ; it ’s more the way it made me feel and 
the way Monsieur acted about it and — well, a 
dream I had about it one night.” 

“A dream?” the girls exclaimed. “What 
was it?” 

“I ’ll get to that presently,” he said. “But 
116 


THE PORTRAIT OF MYSTERY 

first I want to tell you what Monsieur said 
about it. A day or two after I was taken to 
that room I asked him whose portrait it was. 
He said he would tell me all about it some time, 
but that all he could say at present was that 
the child had been one of the world’s heroic 
martyrs. That, of course, didn’t give me 
much information, but it made me a little more 
interested, and I used to lie and stare at it by 
the hour, wondering how in the world a young- 
ster of six or seven could have been what he 
said. 

“Then came the time when I took that turn 
for the worse, and they thought it was all up 
with me. I had a terrible fever and was deliri- 
ous, too, I guess. And that wretched picture 
haunted me the whole time. Sometimes it 
seemed to be coming toward me rapidly, grow- 
ing larger and larger, and the eyes would glow 
like balls of fire. I used to scream out loud, 
because it somehow seemed as if it would wrap 
itself round me and crush me. Then it would 
seem to retreat way off where I could hardly 
see it, and almost disappear through the wall. 

117 


PARADISE GREEN 


At other times it would turn over, hang upside 
down, and cut up all sorts of antics. And all 
the time I couldn’t seem to take my eyes 
from it. 

“The last night that I was so very ill I had 
an awful dream about it. I thought that sud- 
denly I looked at it, and a queer change had 
happened to the whole thing. Instead of the 
youngster being dressed up in that natty little 
silk coat with lace frills at his neck and wrists 
and the jewelled star on his chest and the little 
riding-whip, his clothes were all queer and 
ragged. He had a bright red cap of some kind 
on his head, and his hair was matted and tan- 
gled. Instead of being plump and smiling, 
he was thin and half -starved looking, and the 
tears were running down his cheeks. And 
while I looked, he suddenly held out his arms 
to me, as if for help. I felt as if I must get 
right out of bed and give him some assistance, 
— I simply must . And I guess I tried, too, 
for I remember the nurses held me down. 
Even after I was much better, I could n’t 
seem to get over the horror of that dream. I 
118 


THE PORTRAIT OF MYSTERY 


hated to look at the picture after that, for fear 
I ’d see it again the same way.” 

“But you also said,” Sue reminded him, 
“that Monsieur acted queerly about the pic- 
ture, too. What did he do?” 

“Oh, yes, that ’s another thing,” added 
Louis. “He used to stand in front of it the 
longest time, gazing at it as steadily as if it 
were the most wonderful thing on earth. Next 
he would turn and stare at me, and then look 
back again at the picture, till I could have 
yelled, it made me so nervous. It was mostly 
when he thought I was asleep or in a stupor, 
but I was n’t either one of those things half as 
much as they thought I was. Once he came 
and stood over me, after I had had my eyes shut 
for a long time, and I heard him muttering 
something about ‘the temple look,’ whatever 
he could have meant by that. It all seemed 
horribly uncanny. I did n’t like it at all. I 
never was so glad of anything in my life as to 
get out of that place and back to my own room 
at last.” 

“But, Louis,” began Carol, in an awed tone, 
119 


PARADISE GREEN 


“whatever do you suppose caused you to have 
that queer dream? It ’s one of the queerest 
things I ever heard. Did Monsieur ever say 
anything to you about the picture that would 
make you think of a thing like that?” 

“Not a single thing,” declared the boy 
stoutly, “except what he said about the ‘heroic 
martyr’ business, and I can’t believe I would 
have made up the rest out of my head. It ’s 
singular — ” 

At this moment, however, Dave came in, and 
the conversation shifted to other topics. 

April 8. Carol and I debated a long while 
as to whether it would be a good idea to tell 
the Imp what Louis had told us last night. 
At first Carol was shocked at the idea of such 
a thing, and she looked at me as though I ’d 
proposed to dynamite her house. But I re- 
minded her that the Imp had been awfully 
amiable to us of late, and really it might n’t 
be such a bad scheme to let her into this, espe- 
cially as she had some inside information of her 
own that some time she might be able to give 
120 


THE PORTRAIT OF MYSTERY 


us the benefit of. This settled Carol’s doubts, 
so to-day we told the Imp. 

When we came to the part about Louis’s 
dream, she grabbed my arm and said : 

“Are you making this up, or is it really 
true?” I never saw her so excited before. 

“Of course it’s true!” I said. “It’s just 
exactly what Louis told us.” 

“Then it ’s the queerest thing I ever heard 
of,” she exclaimed. “O girls, I wish I could 
tell you what I know! You ’d be so startled 
that you ’d jump out of your boots. If only 
Monsieur hadn’t asked me not to mention it 
to any one!” 

“Have n’t you even told Louis?” I asked. 

“No. Monsieur particularly asked me not 
to speak of it to Louis. He asked me to prom- 
ise him that I would not, and he seemed so 
upset about it. But I think I know why now. 
I ’ve tracked down a whole heap of things 
lately. Some time I ’ll let you two in on 
it, if I can do so without breaking any prom- 
ises.” 

The Imp can be a trump when she wants to 

m 


PARADISE GREEN 


be. I wonder if we have permanent !y got on 
the right side of her at last? 

To-day I persuaded Carol to show her poem, 
“The Mysterious Portrait,” to Miss Culling- 
ford. She only agreed to do so for this reason. 
Our paper, The Argus , is offering a prize of 
five dollars for the best poem handed in by any 
member of the freshman class. I don’t believe 
there ’s another one who can write as well as 
Carol, and this is her best piece of work. So 
at last she consented to let Miss Cullingford 
criticize it for her, before she submits it to the 
contest committee. I ’m just crazy to have 
Carol get the prize. 

She says Miss Cullingford took it and read 
it over, — it ’s not very long, — and then began 
to ask her some questions about it. They were 
principally about where she ’d seen this por- 
trait. Carol told her it was in the house of a 
friend, but did n’t say anything that would give 
Miss Cullingford any clue as to where it really 
was. Miss Cullingford told her that the poem 
was very good, and asked her to describe the 
portrait to her a little more in detail. Carol 
122 


THE PORTRAIT OF MYSTERY 


did this as well as she could from memory. At 
last Miss Cullingford told Carol to leave the 
verses with her for a day or two, as she would 
like to consider them at her leisure. It looks 
rather promising for Carol, I think. 

April 9. Another awfully strange thing 
happened to-day. Our last hour for the day 
was English literature, and when it was over 
Miss Cullingford asked Carol to come to her 
after dismissal, as she wanted to talk to her a 
while about her poem. So Carol went to her 
room, but I did n’t wait, because I was anxious 
to get home and help Mother with a new dress 
she ’s been making for me. I told Carol that 
I ’d watch out for her when she came home, 
and run out to the gate to hear what Miss Cul- 
lingford had said about the poem. Carol said 
she would n’t have but a minute to spare, be- 
cause her mother and her Aunt Agatha were 
going to take her to dinner with some friends 
at Bridgeton, and so would be anxious for her 
to hurry and dress so they could catch the four 
o’clock trolley. 


123 


PARADISE GREEN 


I went home by myself and sewed hard for 
an hour or so. About live minutes of four 
Carol came rushing up the road and dashed in 
at her gate, late as usual. I grabbed up my 
coat, and hurried out to catch her before she 
went into the house. She was breathless with 
running, and her eyes had the wildest look. I 
thought it was because she was so late, but she 
panted out : 

“O Susette! I’d give anything if I only 
had the time to talk, but Mother and Aunt 
Agatha will be wild at me, as it is. I ’m so 
late! But what do you think? You ’ll never 
guess. I ’ve found out whose portrait that is 
in Monsieur's room!" 

I was simply stunned. 

“ I don’t believe you!” I cried. “This is 
just a trick. You can’t catch me that way.” 

“No, no! It is n’t a trick. It ’s true!" she 
panted. “You ’ll have to wait till to-morrow. 
I ’ll tell you all about it then.” And she was 
gone into the house without another word. 

This is simply horrible . Can I ever wait till 
to-morrow? 

124 


CHAPTER IX 


CABOL MAKES A DISCOVERY OF HEB OWN 

T O Sue, the night that followed seemed 
endless. The mere idea that Carol had 
actually discovered something, and then had n’t 
even had a chance to give her the faintest ink- 
ling about it, was enough to keep her from a 
wink of sleep. But dawn came at last, and 
with the first light she was up and dressing 
frantically. If she had thought of it, she 
might have known that her chum would not be 
about for the next three hours. Breakfast on 
that day was only an empty form, and no 
sooner was it over than Sue snatched up her 
books and rushed madly from the house, much 
to the amazement of the rest of her family. 

Never doubting that she would hear the 
whole story from Carol as they walked to the 
village, she was filled with despair when she 
found that Carol’s Aunt Agatha proposed to 
125 


PARADISE GREEN 


walk down with them, in order that they might 
assist her to carry a heavy basket of things she 
was taking to some sick woman in the village. 
Aunt Agatha’s progress was slow, and to Sue’s 
agonized signals Carol could only shake her 
head and dumbly signify that her friend must 
wait till later for revelations. 

But even this was not the end. Also wait- 
ing for the trolley was Louis. 

“Do you mind telling him, too?” whispered 
Sue. 

“I ’d rather not,” returned Carol. “I really 
don’t think I ought to yet !” 

This only added to the mystery. Louis 
wondered much at their unresponsiveness that 
morning, and, in fact, during all the school day 
and the returning trip that afternoon. For 
not another moment offered itself as entirely 
suitable to the tale that Carol was to unfold. 
Once they had reached the Green, however, 
Louis betook himself about his own affairs, and 
the two girls were left alone with their secret. 

“Come up to the den in our barn,” said 
Carol. “That ’s where I want to tell you.” 

126 


CAROL MAKES A DISCOVERY 

“But it ’ll be cold,” objected Sue. “Can’t 
you come into the house?” 

“No. I don’t want to be interrupted, and 
I ’ve something to show you,” insisted Carol 
darkly. 

Consumed with wonder, Sue obediently fol- 
lowed her up the hay-loft ladder, and they 
locked themselves into the chilly, liay-scented 
den. 

“Now do begin at once !” exclaimed Sue. “I 
never spent such an awful, maddening day of 
suspense in my life. Don’t wait a minute!” 

“I ’m just as crazy to tell you as you are to 
hear it,” responded Carol. “Do you think I 
have n’t been boiling with impatience all day ? 
Well, here goes! Susette, it’s the queerest 
thing in the world, the way I happened across 
this. It ’s all through Miss Cullingford. 
That day, after I ’d described the picture to 
her as well as I could, I remember that she 
looked puzzled and said, ‘That somehow 
sounds familiar to me.’ But I didn’t think 
anything of the remark at the time, because I 
was too interested in what she was going to say 

m 


PARADISE GREEN 


about my poem, and I soon forgot it. But 
yesterday, when I went to her after school, she 
asked me if I ’d recognize the picture if I saw 
it again, and I said that of course I would. 
Then she suddenly drew a book out of her desk 
and opened it at a certain page. And, Sue, 
will you believe me when I tell you? There 
was a copy of that very same picture , right 
before my eyes!” 

“Well, for goodness sake, tell me who it was, 
or I ’ll die of curiosity!” cried Sue impatiently. 

“That ’s just what I don’t know,” Carol an- 
swered. “But I have the book here. It be- 
longs to Miss Cullingford, and she offered to 
lend it to me. Of course, when I saw it, I 
acted surprised, but not half as much so as I 
felt, because I did n’t want to have to tell her 
anything about Louis. I only said that it 
seemed to be the same picture, and she said it 
must have been some copy that I ’d seen, for 
the portrait was a famous one, painted by a 
famous artist. Then she went on to criticize 
my poem, and made one or two suggestions 
about some little changes in it. She said that 
128 


CAROL MAKES A DISCOVERY 


if I made them, she thought the poem stood a 
fair chance of winning the prize. Then she 
offered to lend me the book to take home and 
read, because she thought I might be interested 
in it. She little knew how desperately inter- 
ested I was ! But come ! Let ’s look at it for 
ourselves, and see if we can find out anything 
we ’d like to know.” 

Carol took the book out of a desk where she 
had locked it, and opened it at a certain page. 
And there, staring right up at them, was the 
selfsame picture that hung in Monsieur’s 
room, — the “boy of nut-brown hair and smil- 
ing eyes.” Only of course the picture was in 
black and white, not colored as in the oil-paint- 
ing. But it was the same ; you could n’t mis- 
take it. And underneath the portrait it said, 
“The Dauphin of France.” 

“Carol,” said Sue, after she ’d read it, “will 
you tell me what on earth a ‘dauphin’ is?” 

“I have n’t the faintest idea,” answered the 
other. “I never heard the word before, and I 
have n’t had a chance to look it up anywhere. 
It looks something like the word ‘dolphin.’ 

129 


PARADISE GREEN 

Perhaps it ’s the French for it. And yet I 
don’t think that is likely. A dolphin is some 
kind of a sea-creature, like a porpoise, is n’t 
it? So it couldn’t have any such meaning 
here.” 

“But what is this book?” asked Sue. 

They looked at the title, and it was, “Mem- 
oirs of Madame Lebrun.” Carol said that 
Miss Cullingford had told her that it was an 
account of the life of a famous French artist 
and of the pictures she had painted. As that 
did n’t give them any special help, they turned 
the pages eagerly, but could n’t seem to find 
out a thing about this particular picture that 
interested them. 

“Wait a minute,” said Carol. “I ’ll run 
into the house and look up the word in our big 
dictionary. Maybe I can find it there.” 

She came flying back after a few moments, 
all excitement, panting: 

“It was there! I did n’t dare hope it would 
be. It gave a whole lot about how the word 
originated. We were n’t so far off the track 
when we thought of ‘dolphin.’ It did come 
130 


CAROL MAKES A DISCOVERY 

from that! But anyhow, the principal mean- 
ing was, ‘The eldest son of the King of France. 
The heir to the throne.’ It also says that there 
is n’t any such title in France now.” 

After that they just sat and stared at the 
picture in silent amazement. What in the 
world could it all mean? If they ’d been con- 
fused before, they were now more muddled 
than ever. Suddenly an idea occurred to Sue. 

“Which dauphin do you suppose it was?” 
she questioned. “There must have been a lot 
of them.” 

“Maybe we could find out if we read the 
book through,” suggested Carol helplessly. 

The task, indeed, appeared herculean. 
Neither of the girls were in the least interested 
in memoirs, or in any other literature of that 
“dull” class. Both had frequently acknowl- 
edged that only stories of adventure and mys- 
tery and excitement contained the least inter- 
est for them. There seemed, however, no 
other way out of this tangle. 

“Well, all right! If we must, we must, I 
suppose,” said Sue. “I ’d attempt ’most any- 
131 


PARADISE GREEN 


thing for the sake of solving this mystery. 
Suppose we read it aloud, turn and turn about. 
But for goodness sake, don’t let ’s try to do it 
up here. We ’ll freeze. What if people do 
see us with it? They’ll probably only think 
we ’re reading it for study. The Imp might 
suspect something, but she — ” 

Suddenly Carol interrupted with: 

“See here! Why not tell the Imp? She ’s 
evidently found out a lot of things on her own 
hook, and she even said she might tell us about 
them some time, if she could. Perhaps we ’ve 
got ahead of her on this. I ’d just enjoy get- 
ting ahead of her for once ! Let ’s tell her and 
see what happens.” 

It was now Sue’s turn to demur. Carol was 
so insistent, however, that she finally gave a re- 
luctant consent, and they went out to hunt up 
the Imp. A little triumphantly Sue led her 
younger sister up to the loft, and with just a 
touch of patronage she promised her the sur- 
prise of her life when she got there. But to 
their intense chagrin, the two girls found, as 
they had discovered many times before, that 
1S2 


CAROL MAKES A DISCOVERY 

they had, so to speak, to get up very early in 
the morning to get ahead of the Imp. 

‘‘Look!” cried Carol, exhibiting the picture. 
“What do you think of that?” 

The Imp gave it only one disdainful glance. 

“Huh!” she sniffed. “Aren’t you a little 
late in the day? I discovered the same thing 
about a month ago in the same book, or in one 
just like it!” 

The two sat staring at her in stunned silence. 
Then Carol glanced at the book. 

“It ’s so, Sue,” she murmured. “It ’s the 
very same kind of a book that we saw her show- 
ing to Monsieur that day. Look at the light 
green cover.” 

It was indeed the same! But the Imp had 
had her triumph and now could afford to be 
magnanimous. - 

“Since you ’ve discovered the same thing,” 
she said, “ I ’ll tell you how I happened to 
come across it. Our teacher, Miss Hastings, 
recently brought and hung up in the school- 
room some pretty new pictures. One that I 
liked very much was called ‘The Girl with the 
133 


PARADISE GREEN 


Muff.’ One day I asked Miss Hastings some- 
thing about it, and she told me who the artist 
was and said there was a book in the library 
about her, with pictures of her other paintings 
in it. Next day she brought the book to school 
and let me look at it. And, girls, it was this 
book, or one like it, and while I was looking it 
over I almost jumped out of my shoes to come 
across this very picture. I did n’t say a word 
about it, though, hut just went and joined the 
library and got the hook out and read it all.” 

“And did you find out who this dauphin 
was?” Sue asked breathlessly. 

“I certainly did,” answered the Imp, “and 
a whole lot more besides.” 

“Well, who was he, then?” 

“I wonder if I ought to tell you?” said the 
Imp reflectively. “You see I promised Mon- 
sieur I would n’t say anything about what I 
had discovered. As you can guess now, I 
showed it to him, and it quite took him off his 
feet with surprise. He begged me to say noth- 
ing about it to any one.” 

“Look here!” exclaimed Sue suddenly. 

134 


CAROL MAKES A DISCOVERY 


“ You told us once, quite a long while ago, that 
you asked Monsieur one day who the picture 
of the ‘nice little boy’ in his room was, and 
that he told you then. So how could he be 
surprised when you found it out later?” 

Sue thought she ’d surely caught the Imp 
that time. But the other only laughed. 

“He only told me just what you said he 
told Louis — that it was one of the world’s 
‘heroic martyrs.’ I was teasing you girls into 
thinking I knew it all. You ’d been pretty 
hateful to me just around that time.” 

“I thought as much !” said Sue. “But we ’ll 
forgive you now, if you ’ll tell us what you 
know. There can’t be any harm in it, since 
we ’ve discovered just what you have.” 

But the Imp wouldn’t have been herself, 
if she had acted in a way like ordinary folks. 
She stood and thought it over for a moment, 
keeping them on tenter-hooks all the time. 
Then she remarked: 

“No, I don’t honestly think it would be keep- 
ing my promise, if I said a word to you about 
it. I ’m going to keep that, whatever else I 
135 


PARADISE GREEN 


do. But I ’ll open the book at one picture be- 
fore I go, and that ’s all the hint I ’m going to 
give you.” She took the book and laid it open 
at a certain place, and then dashed down the 
stairs before they had time to say another 
word. 

The two girls almost fell over each other in 
their hurry to see what the picture was. It 
was a beautiful woman, and underneath it were 
the words, “Marie Antoinette.” 

“What in the world has she got to do with 
it?” demanded Sue. “Of course we all know 
who she was. Did n’t she get killed, or some- 
thing, in the French Revolution? But what 
has that to do with this dauphin?” 

“Perhaps she was some relation,” suggested 
Carol. “If she was the queen, maybe he was 
her son?” 

“Tell you what!” Sue interrupted. “Let ’s 
go to the library to-morrow and hunt up some 
book on the French Revolution, or some other 
French history, and see if we can clear this 
thing up. I ’m not going to wade through this 
136 


CAROL MAKES A DISCOVERY 


book. It doesn’t seem to say a thing about 
what we want to know.” 

Carol agreed that this seemed the best course 
to pursue. Plainly, it would be useless to con- 
sult “Madame Lebrun” any further. They 
took the green book that had given them its 
startling revelation and hid it safely in the 
desk. Then they turned to go. Suddenly 
Carol faced her friend. 

“Susette Birdsey, what do you make of all 
this, anyway? What has it to do with Mon- 
sieur and — with Louis?” 

“I ’m as much at sea as ever,” admitted Sue. 

“Well, you remember what I told you the 
other day,” remarked Carol impressively. 
“There ’s more here than we have ever 
dreamed. I ’m more firmly convinced of that 
than ever!” 


157 


CHAPTER X 


JOTTINGS FROM THE JOURNAL 

PRIL 12, 1914. Well, we ’ve found out 



all about that dauphin, and an exhaust- 
ing piece of work it was. I never waded 
through so much history before in all my life. 
If the Imp had n’t given us that hint, though, 
it would have been far worse, for we would n’t 
have had the least idea where to begin. 

We went to the library this morning and 
spent till lunch-time there, and then went back 
again this afternoon. As it was the Easter 
holidays, we fortunately had all the time to 
spend on it that we wanted. But I must tell 
all about what we ’ve discovered. Some of it 
is very, very confusing. We can’t understand 
what it can possibly have to do with Louis, and 
yet there are things about it that make us sure 
that it somehow has something to do with him. 


138 


JOTTINGS FROM THE JOURNAL 


To begin with, there is n’t a shadow of doubt 
that this portrait is of the dauphin who was the 
son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, king 
and queen of France around the time of the 
French Revolution. They seemed to he hav- 
ing a pretty mixed up and bloody time in 
France just about that period, and everybody 
had it in for the royal family and all the no- 
bility. The common people somehow got con- 
trol of things, and first they put the king and 
queen and dauphin and his sister in prison, and 
then they killed the king and queen. The 
dauphin was a little boy of six or seven at the 
time, and they did n’t kill him, but kept him 
a prisoner for three years in a place called the 
Temple Tower, till finally he died of neglect. 
I think it said that he died in 1795. 

It just ma(|e us wild to read about how 
shamefully they treated that poor little fellow. 
They gave him in charge of a horrible, cruel 
cobbler, named Simon, who beat and ill-used 
him abominably, — just because he happened 
to be the child of a king, — and then afterward 
they shut him up in a room by himself, where 
139 


PARADISE GREEN 


he never saw a single soul for six months, and 
handed him his food as they would to a dog in 
a kennel. At the end of that time they ap- 
peared to be a bit sorry for the way they ’d 
acted, and let him come out into a decent room 
and tried to take a little better care of him. 
But it was too late, for he died soon afterward, 
— as I should think he would after standing 
that kind of treatment for three years. 

Carol and I got so worked up over the thing 
that we almost cried. We felt awfully to 
think that a poor, innocent, little chap should 
be treated that way by people who were fight- 
ing for liberty and justice, as the French were. 
It did n’t make any difference if he was a king’s 
son. He had just as much right to be fairly 
treated as any one, and more, because he was 
so little and helpless. I don’t wonder that 
Monsieur said he was one of the world’s heroic 
martyrs. One book said that he was always 
so sweet and gentle and winning. His pretty 
manner at times even softened the hearts of 
some of his cruel jailers. 

Well, that ’s the history of the dauphin. 

140 


JOTTINGS FROM THE JOURNAL 

He would have been Louis XVII, if he had 
lived to become a king. The portrait of him 
must have been painted before all the trouble 
broke out. At that time the poor little fellow 
could not have dreamed what he was going to 
suffer later. It ’s well that he did n’t know. 

As there did n’t seem to be any more to find 
out, we decided we ’d better go home. 

I was longing for a chance to tell the Imp 
what we ’d discovered, but she had a bad sore- 
throat from getting her feet wet this after- 
noon, and Mother had put her to bed. So I 
must wait till to-morrow. But since I ’ve had 
an opportunity to sit down and think this all 
over quietly, I ’ve been trying to see what con- 
nection all these things can possibly have with 
affairs across the Green. So far, however, 
nothing but unanswered questions has been the 
result. 

For instance, I can not understand why 
Monsieur should consider that portrait as one 
of his most treasured possessions. Of course 
the story about the boy is terribly sad, but un- 
less he was some relative of Monsieur’s (which 
141 


PARADISE GREEN 


is quite impossible), why should Monsieur 
cherish the picture? He never saw the child, 
and can’t possibly have any affection for him. 
I don’t understand it. And what are those 
two other pictures, so carefully covered? Per- 
haps they are more portraits of the same child, 
painted later and too sad to be looked at? 
I ’d love to know. 

I wonder, too, if Louis knew about this 
dauphin, would he still continue to hate the 
picture? Or would he be afraid of it? I ’m 
just crazy to tell him, yet I suppose it would n’t 
be fair, — at present, anyway. Good gracious! 
An idea has just occurred to me. I happened 
to think of that strange dream Louis said he 
had when he was sick. Was there ever any- 
thing so curious? I remember that he said 
the little fellow seemed so changed, with ragged 
clothes and matted hair and tear-stained cheeks 
and a red cap on his head! Why, that is just 
the way one of those books described him after 
he was put in charge of the cobbler. Simon 
took away all his nice clothes and made him 
wear a red “liberty-cap,” and forced him to 
142 


JOTTINGS FROM THE JOURNAL 

sing the songs of the revolution and dance for 
him. And Louis dreamed all that change in 
his appearance, yet he does n’t know who the 
subject of the portrait is and very little, if 
anything, about this dauphin, in all probabil- 
ity. This is simply uncanny! I must tell 
Carol in the morning. 

April 19. I have n’t had a chance to write 
a thing in this journal for a week. We have 
been having the dressmaker. She ’s getting 
all our spring things in order, and I ’ve had to 
help her and Mother with the sewing every 
spare minute that I’ve had. Father’s been 
laid up, too, with an acute attack of rheuma- 
tism, and was in bed several days. For nearly 
half the week I did n’t even go to school. So, 
altogether, I ’ve been having a rather strenu- 
ous time. 

Rut, all the same, I have n’t forgotten our 
mystery for a single minute. Carol has kept 
me posted on anything new that has happened, 
though nothing special did happen till yester^ 
day. She has been madly reading history ever 
1 43 


PARADISE GREEN 


since. She always did have a taste for it, and 
this has given her the inspiration to read up 
French history from the very beginning. She 
says she ’s finding it as interesting as a story. 
Well, maybe she is, but I ’m sure I would n’t. 

One thing she said was that the more she 
read, the more she felt that the French were n’t 
much to blame for what they did while getting 
rid of their kings and queens in that revolu- 
tion. Of course they might have used gentler 
means, but they were probably too exasperated 
by the way they ’d been downtrodden. From 
almost the beginning the reigning monarchs 
were a precious lot 3 evidently considering it 
their chief business in life to squeeze the most 
they could out of their subjects. Each one 
felt he ’d lived in vain, apparently, if he had n’t 
gone his ancestor one better at that occupation! 
Carol says that Louis XVI seems to have been 
a lot better than most of them, but by that time 
the French were too furious to consider that, 
I suppose. Anyway, he had to suffer for what 
his ancestors had done. 

We haven’t seen much of Monsieur lately. 

144 


JOTTINGS FROM THE JOURNAL 


Louis says he has n’t been well. This climate 
doesn’t agree with him, and he has rheuma- 
tism and gout, and has caught a dreadful cold. 
I don’t see why he stays here, if it makes him 
so miserable. Anyhow, he was in such bad 
shape that he decided to go to New York to 
spend a few days at a sanitarium, and Miss 
Yvonne had to take him there, for he was too 
sick to go alone. He went yesterday, and last 
night a queer thing happened. Carol told me 
about it this afternoon, giving the account as 
Louis told it to her while coming home from 
school on the trolley. 

It seems that he and his uncle were sitting 
downstairs in the living-room when, about nine 
o’clock, they heard a dreadful crash upstairs, 
directly over their heads. They could n’t think 
what in the world it could be, and were so star- 
tled that neither of them moved or spoke for 
a moment. Then Louis jumped up, exclaim- 
ing: 

“Something ’s the matter in Monsieur’s 
room! That’s right overhead. I’ll go up 
and see.” 


115 


PARADISE GREEN 

At first his uncle did n’t seem to want him 
to go, saying he ’d rather go himself. But as 
he ’s very feeble and does n’t go upstairs often 
(his bedroom is on the lower floor), Louis 
would n’t hear of it and insisted that at least 
they go together. So up they went. 

When they reached Monsieur’s room and 
struck a light, they saw that the picture of 
the boy had fallen to the floor and that the 
glass was broken. Evidently, the wire by 
which it was hung had become rusty and given 
way, for the picture is very heavy. Louis 
did n’t think much of the occurrence. He 
merely remarked that he ’d clean up the broken 
glass and get a glazier to come in the morning 
and put in a new one. Also, he said he ’d get 
some new wire and rehang it. 

But for some unknown reason old Mr. 
Meadows was nearly wild. He stood and 
wrung his hands, and walked up and down, as 
if something perfectly awful had happened. 
Louis could n’t make out what in the world 
was the matter with him. Finally he said : 

“It ’s all right, Uncle. What are you so ex- 
146 


JOTTINGS FROM THE JOURNAL 


cited about? I ’m going to have it all fixed 
up to-morrow. It will be as good as ever. 
The picture itself is n’t damaged a bit.” 

But even then his uncle couldn’t seem to 
calm down, and all Louis could get from him 
was this remark, repeated over and over: 

“ ’T is an evil omen! An unfortunate sign! 
On no account must Monsieur know of it!” 

Louis said that was all right; he needn’t 
know of it. The picture would be all fixed up 
long before Monsieur came back. And even 
Miss Yvonne need n’t hear of it, for he ’d see 
that it was in place before she came home to- 
day. This seemed to calm Mr. Meadows some- 
what, and he finally consented to have it so. 
But all the evening he kept muttering, “An 
evil omen!” to himself, and acted uneasy. 
Louis says he does n’t see any sense in it. I 
can’t say that I do either, even with what I 
know, and yet it does seem sort of queer. 

I ’m too tired to write much more to-night, 
and yet I must tell about how the Imp acted 
when we told her of what we ’d unearthed in 
the histories about the dauphin. 

147 


PARADISE GREEN 


We were awfully enthusiastic over telling 
her, for we felt sure she would think we ’d done 
a good piece of work. As a matter of fact, 
Carol and I doubted very much whether the 
Imp could possibly have found out as much 
as we had, for we ’d dug into things so thor- 
oughly. We felt sure we were giving her 
some points she hadn’t discovered, and we 
were rather proud of ourselves. Imagine our 
disgust when she remarked, after we ’d fin- 
ished : 

“Well, you’ve done very nicely, children!” 
She always calls us “children” when she wants 
to be patronizing and unpleasant. I thought 
it strange that she should suddenly turn hor- 
rid, when she ’s acted so friendly of late. 

“Don’t be hateful,” I said, “but admit that 
we have given you some good points.” 

“I don’t mean to be hateful,” she retorted, 
“but it makes me mad to see how little you girls 
use your brains.” 

“I don’t think that ’s a nice remark,” I said, 
“but I ’ll forgive you for it, if you ’ll be kind 
enough to explain what you mean.” 

148 


JOTTINGS FROM THE JOURNAL 

“Why, just this,” she answered. “There are 
one, two, — yes, three points in things you know 
about that you have n’t connected with this 
picture or this history at all, so far as I can 
see.” 

“What are they?” I demanded. 

“You know that I can’t tell you,” she re- 
plied. “I can only advise you to use your 
brains and your memories.” 

“Anything else?” I inquired, as mildly as I 
could, for by that time I was getting furious 
with her. 

“Yes, one thing more,” she said. “You 
were trying to be patronizing, were n’t you, 
when you asked me if you hadn’t given me 
some good points. As if it was n’t I who put 
you on the right track in the beginning ! I ’ ve 
always said that you two were an ungrateful 
pair, and now I ’m sure of it. I ’ll give you 
just one more piece of information, and then 
I ’m through. You thought you had discov- 
ered more than I have? Why, I Ve un- 
earthed so much more that you have n’t even 
touched or suspected that you ’d be perfectly 
149 


PARADISE GREEN 

amazed, if you knew what I do!” With that, 
she flounced out of the room. 

I can’t help but believe the Imp, mad as she 
has made me. Goodness knows when she 11 
come round to being amiable again, for once 
she goes off on a tangent like this, she stays 
off for a good long while. It ’s too bad ! 

What in the world can those three things be 
that she was talking about? 


150 


CHAPTER XI 


LOUIS SPRINGS A SURPRISE AND THE 

CONSEQUENCES THEREOF 

M AY 1, 1914. Nothing special has hap- 
pened during the last two weeks that is 
worth writing about. Carol and I have n’t 
made the least progress in solving the riddles 
I last mentioned. The Imp fulfilled all my 
expectations, and has been most objectionable 
ever since that day. Queer how she turns com- 
pletely around at times, especially when she 
feels the least bit touchy, and acts as if we were 
her mortal enemies. She has hardly spoken to 
us lately. 

Monsieur came home from his sanitarium, 
and seems a lot improved. The weather is 
lovely, anyhow, and he stays outdoors a good 
deal, so I suppose that helps, too. Carol and 
I have had several interesting talks with him. 
You can’t help seeing a good deal of your 
151 


PARADISE GREEN 


neighbors in this shut-off spot around the 
Green, when the weather is nice, and even 
Monsieur seems to have become used to stroll- 
ing over and having little friendly chats with 
us. He has “thawed out” a lot, and actually 
seems quite human now . The Imp is still his 
favorite, of course, but he has come to realize 
our existence when she is n’t about. 

What I wanted specially to write about to- 
night was the delightful time we had to-day. 
Louis gave us all a treat, and besides provid- 
ing such a good time, he also gave us the sur- 
prise of our lives. There was to be a big 
aviation exhibition over in Bridgeton this after- 
noon, and yesterday Louis gave us all invita- 
tions to go with him and see it. He said he 
had unusually good seats on the flying field. 
It was something we would n’t have missed for 
anything, and so we all went, — Dave, Carol, 
and myself, and even the Imp. Louis said he 
had invited Monsieur, too, but Monsieur did 
not care to go, not feeling as well as usual to- 
day. 

I ’ve never seen an aeroplane near by before. 

152 


LOUIS SPRINGS A SURPRISE 


To tell the truth, the nearest I ever did see one 
was probably a thousand feet up in the air, 
sailing over our house one time. We had gor- 
geous seats right in front, and could see every- 
thing plainly. I was so thrilled when the first 
one rolled out and soared up majestically that 
I could have risen and shouted myself hoarse. 
Carol had to pull me down once, to keep me 
from tumbling right over the railing in my 
excitement. But that was nothing to what 
was to come. We were so absorbed that we 
did n’t notice that after a while Louis slipped 
away and disappeared. What was our aston- 
ishment to see him suddenly strolling down the 
field in a regular aviator’s costume, with a hel- 
met in his hand. He came over to us, laugh- 
ing, and said: 

“I know I ’ve given you all a shock, that is, 
all except Dave. He ’s been in the secret. 
But I might as well up and confess my crimes 
now. I ’ve been mad about this aviation busi- 
ness for a year or more, and I have been study- 
ing it secretly for some time. A fellow I 
know here in Bridgeton has a machine and is 
153 


PARADISE GREEN 


to fly to-day. His name is Page Calvin. He 
has n’t gone up yet. I ’ve studied and worked 
on his machine till I know it by heart, but I Ve 
never been up in it yet. To-day he ’s going to 
take me up, and if I stand it all right, — some 
people can’t, you know, — why then it ’s avia- 
tion for me, in preference to everything else!” 

Well, we were so thunderstruck that we 
could n’t say a word for a moment, and just 
gasped. At last I managed to stammer: 

“And — and is Dave going in for this, too?” 

“Not I!” said Dave. “I haven’t any head 
for it. I get too dizzy. But I ’m going to 
help Louis build a model aeroplane when we ’ve 
finished that motor-boat. I ’m interested in 
the mechanical part of it.” 

“But what about Monsieur?” Carol asked 
Louis. “Have you told him about this?” 

“No, I have n’t,” said Louis. “That ’s why 
I wanted him to come to-day, so that I could 
surprise him, too. I ’in sorry he could n’t — ” 

Just then some one came and told Louis 
that the biplane he was to go up in was ready, 
so that he said good-bye and walked away. 

154 


LOUIS SPRINGS A SURPRISE 

We watched him put on his helmet and climb 
into the machine, and I confess now that I 
never expected to see him alive again. It ’s 
all right when some one you don’t know is go- 
ing up; you ’ re just excited and thrilled. But 
when it ’s some one that you do , you ’re simply 
frozen stiff with fright, and you’re morally 
certain that he ’ll come crashing to earth any 
second ! 

Carol and I gripped hands and held our 
breath, and I believe it was the longest fifteen 
minutes I ever knew or expect to know. They 
sailed completely out of sight for a while, and 
then the suspense was worse. But at last the 
biplane came back and settled on the field as 
gracefully as a bird. Louis was wild with ex- 
citement when he returned to us, and he says 
it ’s the most wonderful experience imaginable. 
The Imp was so worked up over it that she 
wanted Louis to persuade his friend to take 
her up and “loop the loop”! He laughed, and 
told her it was not allowed, but I believe that 
for a while she really thought she could tease 
him into it. 


155 


PARADISE GREEN 


There was one other exciting thing that 
happened. Toward the last a machine went 
up and something went wrong with the engine 
when it was about two hundred and fifty feet 
in the air. It began to droop over in a sort 
of lopsided fashion, and then began to settle, 
like a bird that has been wounded in the wing. 
Before it reached the ground it was almost up- 
side down, and every one was nearly frantic, 
thinking the man in it would fall out. But 
he did n’t, and at last it came to earth with 
quite a crash. A lot of people rushed to help 
the aviator out, Louis among them. He 
was n’t killed, but they said he had a badly 
fractured arm, and we saw him being fairly 
carried off the field. It made me actually 
sick to think what a horribly dangerous career 
Louis was letting himself in for. But it did n’t 
seem to disturb him a bit. All he would say 
was that a careful aviator would never let a 
thing like that happen. 

It was late when we came home, so we in- 
vited Louis and Carol over to our house to tea, 
and had a jolly evening afterward. 

156 


LOUIS SPRINGS A SURPRISE 


I ’ve had a gorgeous day and, as Louis said, 
“the surprise of my life.” But I Cannot help 
wondering how Monsieur is going to take this 
piece of news. 

It was the day after Louis’s great surprise, 
and, since it was Saturday, he was out in the 
barn hard at work putting the finishing touches 
to the motor-boat that was to be launched on 
the river during the coming week. Carol, Sue, 
and the Imp had also drifted over to admire the 
“toot-and-scramble,” as the Imp insisted on 
pronouncing Louis’s favorite French expres- 
sion, tout ensemble . 

“Won’t it be jolly to have our first picnic 
up the river in her?” remarked the boy, stop- 
ping to glance critically at a stroke of varnish 
he had just administered. “Do you know, I 
really began this boat just to get my hand 
into that kind of mechanical work, but I believe 
we ’re going to have a lot of fun out of her, 
too. However, just you wait till I begin my 
biplane — ” 

At that moment a shadow fell across the 


PARADISE GREEN 


doorway, and the figure of Monsieur entered 
unexpectedly behind the group. 

“Bon matin ” he began, as was his custom. 
Then suddenly and sharply he added in Eng- 
lish to Louis, “What is that you say?” 

“Good-morning,” said Louis, politely. “I 
have n’t seen you, sir, since our expedition 
yesterday, or I would have told you what I told 
the girls at the aviation field. I hope you ’ll be 
pleased.” 

With a visible effort, for, in reality, he 
greatly dreaded this revelation to Monsieur, 
yet simply and directly he told the old gentle- 
man what he had said and done on the previous 
day. 

The result was as unexpected as it was dis- 
tressing. Not one of the listeners but was 
fully prepared to see the excitable French 
gentleman rage and storm and attempt to for- 
bid Louis to engage in so dangerous a pursuit. 
From all they had heard of him, they could 
imagine no other course of action. They were 
entirely unprepared, however, for the strange 
quiet with which he received the news. It was 
158 


LOUIS SPRINGS A SURPRISE 

not till Louis began to tell of yesterday’s flight 
that Monsieur suddenly raised his hand and 
cried in a low voice : 

“Stop! A chair, if you please! I — I feel 
very— ill!” 

Not till then did they notice the strange, 
gray pallor that had crept into his face. Louis 
hurried into the main part of the barn and 
came back with a rickety chair. When he 
had placed it, Monsieur sat down heavily and, 
groaning slightly, pressed his hand to his side. 

“Hurry in — to — Mademoiselle Yvonne!” he 
gasped. “Tell her — bring my medicine. My 
heart! It — it has been weak for years!” 

Louis dashed out of the barn to obey his 
command, and Carol dashed after him, glad 
to get away from the sight of physical suffer- 
ing. But the Imp and Sue stayed with the 
old gentleman, the Imp steadying him in his 
chair with her strong young arm, for he seemed 
to he slipping down. Sue began fanning him 
frantically with a newspaper. It seemed as if 
the other two were gone for an age, and, in 
fact, they were gone longer than might have 
159 


PARADISE GREEN 


been expected, for Miss Yvonne was not about 
the house and had to be hunted up in the big 
garden. 

Before they came back, however, Monsieur 
appeared to grow a trifle easier But the only 
word he said during the absence of the others 
was just before they came back with Miss 
Yvonne. 

“It is useless!” they heard him murmur, and 
the Imp, bending over, asked him what he had 
said and if they could do anything. But he 
acted hardly aware of her presence, and went 
on murmuring something in French. Then 
the others returned, bringing Miss Yvonne, 
breathless and excited, but carrying a bottle 
and spoon. A few moments after taking the 
medicine Monsieur seemed easier, and with the 
help of all he managed to get back to the 
house. 

“It ’s all right now,” Louis told the girls. 
“He says he will go to bed and rest, but the 
worst of the attack is past. Don’t you worry.” 

The three girls wandered back across the 
Green, subdued and upset by what had hap- 
160 


LOUIS SPRINGS A SURPRISE 

pened. Even the Imp was apparently forget- 
ful of her past grievances toward the others. 

“I wonder what he was trying to say?’’ mar- 
velled Sue, as the three roamed aimlessly to- 
ward Carol’s barn. “Did you catch it, Bobs? 
You were nearest to him, and I think he spoke 
in French.” 

“Yes, I caught it,” said the Imp, turning to 
them suddenly. “And look here, girls, I be- 
lieve I might as well tell you the whole thing 
now, if you care to hear. I ’m getting tired 
of the worry of carrying this thing around by 
myself!” 

If she had exploded a bomb in their midst, 
she could not have startled them more. 

“Gracious! What has made you change 
so?” demanded Sue, wonderingly. 

“Well, I feel kind of upset by what has 
happened this morning,” admitted the Imp, 
“and so I feel like getting this thing off my 
mind. Do you know what he was muttering 
in French, as he sat there? It was this: ‘It 
is useless to try any longer to keep the secret. 
I must tell him at once’!” 

161 


PARADISE GREEN 
“So you see, if he tells Louis,” went on the 
Imp, “there ’s no reason, so far as I can see, 
why I should n’t tell you now . Come up into 
your den, and I ’ll tell you all I know!” 

She began to climb the ladder to the hay- 
mow, and the two followed her, silent with 
amazement. 


162 


CHAPTER XII 


WHAT THE IMP KNEW 

T HE three filed into the den off the hay- 
mow, and Carol solemnly padlocked the 
door on the inside. As there were only two 
chairs, the Imp perched herself on the old desk, 
curling her feet up under her. The one win- 
dow was wide open, and through it was wafted 
the scent of lilacs and the sound of a lawn- 
mower propelled by Dave somewhere across 
the Green. For a moment after they were 
seated no one spoke. 

“Well?” said Carol, impatiently. “Go on, 
Imp! Begin somewhere.” 

“I was just wondering where to begin,” ad- 
mitted the Imp. “I was trying to remember 
what you actually do know, but I guess, except 
for the fact as to who that picture is, you don’t 
know a single thing.” 


163 


PARADISE GREEN 


“You once said,” Sue reminded her, “that 
there were three things we actually knew that 
we had n’t connected with this affair. We ’ve 
tried and tried to think what they were, but 
somehow we never could seem to strike them. 
Perhaps you ’d better begin with them ” 

But the Imp ignored this suggestion. 

“I suppose it has dawned on you that that 
picture has some connection with Louis?” she 
asked. 

“We ? ve thought of it, but it seemed so im- 
possible that we finally gave up the idea,” re- 
plied Sue. “What could it possibly have to 
do with him?” 

“Everything,” answered the Imp briefly. 

“Go on, then!” commanded Sue. “You Ve 
kept us on tenter-hooks long enough. If 
you Ve going to tell us at all, do please begin 
at the beginning, and don’t stop till you ’re 
through.” 

“The trouble is just this,” admitted the Imp. 
“I don’t actually know anything much at all. 
It ’s just guesswork, except for one or two 
things. You seem to think Monsieur has told 
164 


WHAT THE IMP KNEW 


me the whole business. Well, he has n’t, — not 
a single thing, — except that I was right about 
knowing who that portrait was, and he asked 
me not to say anything about it, especially to 
Louis. Everything else I ’ve worked out for 
myself, and it may be all wrong; but somehow 
I don’t think it is.” 

The two listeners looked crestfallen. For 
some time past they had come to believe that 
the Imp was wholly and entirely in Monsieur’s 
confidence. It was a shock to learn the truth. 
Carol immediately intimated as much to the 
assembled company. 

“You ’re a pack of sillies,” exclaimed the 
Imp scornfully, “to imagine such a thing, any- 
way! Why, this thing is of — of immense im- 
portance to — well, I was almost going to say 
to the whole world. Do you suppose for one 
moment that a youngster would be let into such 
an important secret?” 

“What are you saying? ‘To the whole 
world’?” cried Carol. “Are you going crazy, 
or do you think you are taking us in again with 
some of your nonsense?” 

165 


PARADISE GREEN 


“I ’m not talking nonsense, and I ’ll prove it. 
Do you know what I discovered by reading 
a little more than you did at the library, and 
also from an old book that Miss Hastings lent 
me, because I told her I was interested in the 
subject? Well, I found out that, although 
most people think it ’s a settled fact that that 
poor little dauphin died in prison, still there 
are a lot of legends that he really escaped, that 
he was helped to escape by some of the Royal- 
ists, and that the little boy who died there 
was n’t the dauphin at all !” 

The Imp stopped to let this startling news 
sink into the minds of her hearers. 

“Rut — but — ” stammered Sue, “if he es- 
caped, what became of him?” 

“That ’s something that never was known,” 
answered the Imp. “After the downfall of 
Napoleon and the restoration of the Bourbons 
in France, there were a lot of pretenders who 
said they were the escaped dauphin and 
claimed the throne. But they never could 
prove it, so no one paid much attention to 
them. Only you see there must have been 
166 


WHAT THE IMP KNEW 


some truth in it, — his escape, I mean, — or no 
one would have thought of such a thing.” 

“But I don’t see, anyway, what all that has 
to do with this affair,” remarked Carol. 

“Don’t you?” replied the Imp coldly. 
“Then you ’re more stupid than I gave you 
credit for being.” 

Carol quite wilted under this rebuke, but 
Sue, who had been doing some rapid thinking, 
cried: 

“Mercy! It can’t be possible that — ” 

“Wait a minute,” interrupted the Imp. 
“I ’m going to answer your question about 
those three things, and see what you make of 
it. Do you remember what they used to call 
Louis XVI — the people, I mean? I ’m sure 
you know, because you mentioned it to me that 
day you were telling me what you ’d found 
out.” 

“ ‘Louis the Locksmith,’ ” answered Carol 
promptly. 

“Right,” said the Imp. “Does that make 
you think of anything?” 

Carol shook her head. 

167 


PARADISE GREEN 


“Oh, you’re hopeless!” groaned the Imp. 
“Try the next one. When Louis was sick one 
time Monsieur stood over him murmuring 
something about ‘the Temple look.’ Does that 
convey anything to your mind?” 

“It does to mine,” interrupted Sue. “Oh, 
I believe I ’m beginning to understand.” 

But Carol still looked hopelessly confused. 

“Well, here ’s the last,” went on the Imp. 
“Why should Monsieur and all the others treat 
Louis in the queer way they do? Why should 
Louis have found Monsieur kissing his hand 
that time?” 

“Oh, please explain clearly , Bobs!” moaned 
Carol. “You mix me up so, firing questions 
at me, that I can’t think at all. Just say 
straight out what it is.” 

“All right, I will. I ’ll say it in words of 
one syllable, suitable to your infant mind,” 
laughed the Imp. “It may sound like the 
craziest idea that ever was imagined, but I be- 
lieve Louis to be a descendant of that little 
dauphin, and I believe Monsieur knows it and 
the Meadows people, too.” 

168 


WHAT THE IMP KNEW 


The conjecture was so stupefying in its 
scope that the three girls sat for a moment in 
dumb, confused wonder. 

“I can’t believe it,” murmured Carol, at 
length. “Right here on little Paradise Green, 
way out of the world, to have such a thing 
happen? Impossible!” 

“It ’s no stranger than lots of other things 
that have happened in history,” asserted the 
Imp, “when you come to think it over. And 
it ’s so possible, too.” 

“But here, here!” cried Sue. “What in the 
world would Louis be doing in America? I 
could believe it more easily if we lived some- 
where in France.” 

“I read in one book,” replied the Imp to this 
objection, “that there was a rumor that after 
the dauphin escaped he was taken to America. 
There was an American Indian, named Elea- 
zar Williams, or something like that, who 
claimed to be the dauphin. So you see it ’s 
not so impossible, after all.” 

“Now I begin to see,” remarked Carol, after 
a long pause, “what you meant by some of those 
169 


PARADISE GREEN 


three things. If Monsieur thinks Louis is a 
descendant of the dauphin, I can understand 
why they all treat him with such respect. 
Why, girls/ : ’ she cried enthusiastically, “just 
think, — Louis — our Louis — may have royal 
blood in his veins! I simply can’t believe it!” 

“That remark about ‘the Temple look’ 
meant, I suppose,” murmured Sue, “that Louis 
looked so awfully when he was sick that it re- 
minded Monsieur how the dauphin must have 
appeared after his bad treatment and illness 
in the Temple Tower. That never occurred 
to me. But I can’t yet see any connection 
with what you said about ‘Louis the Lock- 
smith.’ ” 

“That ’s easy,” answered the Imp. “It was 
one of the first things I thought of. Don’t 
you remember how Louis XVI was always 
tinkering with things and fixing locks, and how 
fond he was of mechanical work? The whole 
court used to resent it. Well, the Meadows 
and Monsieur evidently think that Louis has 
inherited that trait, and it drives them wild. 
Don’t you remember what Louis told us Miss 
170 


WHAT THE IMP KNEW 


Yvonne once said when she found him fixing 
the lock on the kitchen-door? ‘The ancient 
blood ! It will ruin everything !’ Does n’t 
that indicate what they think ?” 

“True enough,” Sue had to admit. “But 
what foolishness all this is, girls, when you 
think of Louis’s history and the history of his 
family! I w T as asking Father about Louis’s 
folks not long ago, just out of curiosity. He 
said that the Durants had lived in and owned 
that house across the Green for many, many 
years, even longer than our descendants have 
lived in our house. It was way hack in the 
eighties when Louis’s father left here and went 
out West. He was a young man then, about 
Father’s age. In fact, they ’d gone to school 
together. But this Charles Durant went away 
out West to better himself, and rented the old 
house on this Green. Father says he never 
saw him again, because Charles Durant and 
the wife he ’d married out there were suddenly 
killed in an accident. The first Father heard 
about it was when old Mr. Meadows and his 
daughter, whom nobody had ever seen before, 
171 


PARADISE GREEN 


came to this place with the tiny baby who was 
Louis, and settled here for good. They never 
said much about themselves, except that they 
were old friends of the Durant family and 
that they had always lived in France. They 
explained that they had come over here to 
take care of and bring up the last Durant baby, 
since its parents had been killed. Now will 
you tell me how anything about a dauphin 
could come in there?” 

“Maybe they did n’t bring the baby from 
out West,” suggested Carol, “but brought him 
over from France with them. Maybe he is n’t 
a Durant at all.” 

“That ’s possible, too,” said the Imp, “but, 
after all, it does n’t make any difference where 
he came from, does it, if Louis is what we 
think he is ?” 

“But who is this ‘Monsieur,’ and what has he 
to do with the whole thing?” suddenly cried 
Carol. 

“That,” admitted the Imp, “is what I can’t 
figure out. I ’m sure he must be some rela- 
tive. They say there are descendants of the 

172 


WHAT THE IMP KNEW 


Bourbons still living. It would n’t be strange 
if he wanted to hunt up a long-lost relative, but 
why he should make such a secret of it is be- 
yond me.” 

“Bobs,” cried Sue, suddenly going off at a 
tangent, “have you any idea about those two 
other pictures in Monsieur’s room, — the ones 
all covered up ? I ’ve stayed awake nights try- 
ing to guess who on earth they could be, and 
why he keeps them covered.” 

“Why, of course I don’t know/' laughed the 
Imp, “but I can make a good guess. I be- 
lieve they ’re portraits of Louis XVI and 
Marie Antoinette. I can’t imagine why he 
keeps them covered, unless it ’s to keep Louis 
or any one else from guessing anything about 
this affair. Of course they ’re very well- 
known portraits, and almost any child would 
know who they were at first sight. But it ’s 
different with the dauphin. Very few people 
know that picture by sight. That ’s the only 
reason I can think of.” 

It seemed such a simple explanation, after 
they ’d heard it, that both girls felt a little 
173 


PARADISE GREEN 

chagrined to think that they ’d never had the 
wit to work out this easy problem. Rut so 
humble were they now, after the Imp’s as- 
tounding revelation, that they were willing to 
admit their inferior wit twenty times over. 

It was Sue who presently voiced the un- 
spoken thought that was in each mind. 

“I wonder how Louis will take all this?” 
she sighed. 

This was a matter that went beyond their 
conjecture. How, indeed, would Louis take 
it? 


174 


CHAPTER XIII 


SUSPICIONS 

M AY 17, 1914. It may seem a strange 
thing, but two whole weeks have gone 
by since the Imp told us what she did, and 
nothing has happened at all. By “nothing” I 
mean that no astonishing developments of any 
kind have occurred. We went out from 
Carol’s barn that day perfectly certain that 
everything — about Louis, at least — would be 
changed and strange and upheaved. We 
lived on a tiptoe of expectation for hours and 
days, but all has gone on over there just the 
same as ever. I can’t understand it. 

That morning, about eleven o’clock, Louis 
came over to tell us that Monsieur was feeling 
much better, and that we need no longer worry 
about him. We all gazed at him curiously, — 
so curiously, I ’m afraid, that he noticed it. 

175 


PARADISE GREEN 

“What ’s the matter?” he asked. “You all 
act as if you were seeing a spook. Is there 
anything wrong about me anywhere?” 

“Oh, no!” I hurried to assure him. “We 
were wondering how Monsieur was getting 
on.” 

“Well, he ’s getting on famously,” said 
Louis, “but I certainly did manage to upset 
him. I was afraid he would n’t take the news 
well, but I did n’t dream it would be as bad 
as that. I only supposed he would rant and 
tear his hair. I ’m horribly sorry, for I ’m ac- 
tually getting a bit fond of the old gentleman, 
queer as he is.” 

“Did he say anything more to you about it?” 
asked the Imp. 

I knew she could n’t resist asking that. I 
was crazy to, myself, but couldn’t pluck up 
the courage. 

“Not another word,” Louis replied. “I ex- 
pected he ’d say a whole dictionary full. He 
did start off once with a word *or two, but evi- 
dently changed his mind. He has n’t even 
hinted at it since.” 


176 







‘‘What’s the matter?” he asked. “Is there anything wrong 
about me anywhere?” 






















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SUSPICIONS 


This seemed a little queer, but we decided 
(after Louis had gone) that Monsieur was 
probably putting off the ordeal till he felt 
stronger. That would be entirely likely. So 
we told each other that by the next day Louis 
would probably know the whole strange truth. 

But the next day came and went, and Louis 
was just the same and nothing was changed, 
even at the end of a week. He told us that 
Monsieur had never so much as alluded to the 
subject again, and, for his part, he was mighty 
glad that the affair had blown over. He said 
he was sure Monsieur would get used to the 
notion after a while. 

So time has passed, and things remain just 
as they were. We cannot imagine what has 
come over Monsieur, — Carol, the Imp, and my- 
self, I mean. Why is he waiting? Why 
does n’t he tell Louis, as he said he would have 
to? What does all this delay mean? 

But if everything remains outwardly the 
same, it is not so with the way we three feel 
about things. I don’t know if I can explain 
the strange change that has come over our feel- 
177 


PARADISE GREEN 

mgs toward Louis and Monsieur and all that 
concerns them, — especially toward Louis. All 
our lives lie has been just ‘Louis Durant,’ the 
nice boy who lived across the Green, who 
played with us from the time we were babies 
and studied with us in the same classes in 
school, who was just like our brother, except 
that he did n’t live in the same house. We 
have always thought of him in the same way 
that we do of Dave. Now, however, every- 
thing is different. He is n’t ‘Louis Durant’ 
any more. He ’s some strange, unknown, 
long-way-off person, whose ancestors were 
monarchs of one of the greatest countries on 
earth, and who might have been a king him- 
self, if things had gone a little differently. I 
simply can’t feel near to, and well-acquainted 
with, a person like that. Carol says she can’t, 
either, and the Imp admits that she ’s felt so 
a good while longer than we have. 

It seems as if our Louis had been taken 
away forever and a strange, unapproachable 
person had been put in his place. Not that 
Louis himself acts any differently. He ’s ex- 
178 


SUSPICIONS 


actly the same as ever, of course, and he ’s 
said a dozen times in the course of the last 
week: 

“What ’s come over you girls, anyway? 
You ’re all the time gazing at me with eyes 
as big as dinner-plates, and you act so queerly 
and are so absent-minded that I don’t know 
you ! Has a realization of the fact that I hope 
some day to be a full-fledged aviator had such 
a doleful effect on you as all that? You 
have n’t been the same since that day. I wish 
to goodness that I ’d never told you, if you ’re 
going to take it in this silly way.” 

Of course we try to assure him that nothing 
at all is the matter, but it does n’t work very 
well. 

We three have talked a number of times 
about whether we ought to breathe a word of 
what we suspect to Louis, but the Imp says 
positively, “No.” If he is to know, she says, 
he must learn it from Monsieur and from no 
other. In fact, by rights she ought not to 
have let us into the secret, and she would n’t 
have done so, except that she thought there 
179 


PARADISE GREEN 


would be no reason why she should n’t after 
Monsieur had told Louis. Since he appar- 
ently has n’t told him anything yet, it is our 
duty to keep the secret. I guess she must be 
right. I would n’t want to be the one to tell 
Louis, anyway. 

Our final exams for this year are coming in 
a week or so, and we are all “cramming” hard, 
so I probably won’t have a chance to think of 
much else for some time to come. 

June 3, 1914. Everything is just about the 
same as when I last wrote in this journal. 
Nothing is changed, as far as we can see, in 
affairs across the Green. We are all so busy 
working for and taking our examinations that 
we haven’t had much time to think about it, 
especially Carol, who is weak in mathematics, 
and I, who always dread Latin. Only the 
Imp remains unworried by these troubles. 
Her studies never did cause her a moment’s 
uneasiness, as far as I can see, though how she 
gets through them, when she never makes even 
a pretense of studying, is beyond me. 

180 


SUSPICIONS 


Monsieur is about again in the usual way, 
and two or three times Carol and I have had 
a few moments’ conversation with him, while 
he was strolling on the Green. I simply can’t 
describe the uncanny feeling I have when with 
him now. If he was a mysterious person be- 
fore, he ’s a million times more so now, and 
every moment that I ’m talking to him I find 
myself in a panic, for fear those eagle eyes of 
his will bore into my mind and discover the 
fact that I know his secret. Of course I don’t 
suppose he realizes for a moment what he said 
that day he was taken so ill, and certainly he 
does not dream that the Imp was keen enough 
to unearth what she did. He is polite and 
courteous and stilted — and very French — in his 
manner toward us, and I suppose he no more 
dreams that we know what we do than he sup- 
poses that the sky will fall on him. 

One thing is beginning to disturb me very 
much. It ’s a suspicion that occurred to the 
Imp, and that she confided to us a day or two 
ago. She rather startled Carol and me by 
suddenly putting this question to us : 

181 


PARADISE GpREEN 

“What do you figure out that Monsieur’s 
plans are?” 

“How on earth should we know?” said I. 

“Well, you must admit that he probably has 
some, or he would n’t be dangling around here 
so long,” replied the Imp. “Why should n’t 
he tell Louis what he has to tell, and then go 
away or take Louis away, as the case may be?” 

“What do you think, Bobs?” asked Carol. 
“I ’ll warrant you have worked it all out.” 

“If I tell you what I think, you ’ll tell me 
I ’m a lunatic,” declared the Imp. “It does 
sound rather crazy, and yet why should n’t it 
be so?” 

“Why shouldn’t what be so?” I cried. 
“You have n’t even told us yet.” 

“Well, here ’s my notion,” she said. “Sup- 
pose — well, just suppose that somebody 
wanted to overthrow the present government 
of France. Wouldn’t this be a lovely 
chance?” 

We were struck dumb with amazement by 
this astounding proposition. 

“I guess you are a lunatic!” I said. “But 
182 


SUSPICIONS 

even lunatics ought to have a chance to explain 
themselves. Go on.” 

“Oh, I know it sounds foolish,” returned 
the Imp, “but, after all, is it any more foolish 
than the possibility that our Louis may be a 
descendant of a king of France? Just think 
what that means. Suppose there are a lot 
of discontented descendants of royalists in 
France, who are dissatisfied with the present 
form of government. And suppose that they 
hear there is a direct descendant of Louis XVI 
now living. Wouldn’t it be a lovely chance 
to get up a secret insurrection in his favor and 
so restore him to the throne? It would n’t be 
the first time that a republic has been over- 
thrown in that country, if you remember. 
And if this Monsieur happens to be a Bourbon 
relation, he ’d be all the more interested.” 

Just then Carol gave a gasp, and cried out: 

“Yes, and do you remember the way that 
first cablegram commenced? 'Time almost 
ripe’! I always did think that was queer.” 

“Exactly what I said,” continued the Imp. 
“And what do you suppose Monsieur is twid- 
183 


PARADISE GREEN 


dling his thumbs around Paradise Green for? 
Just because Louis is n’t falling in with his 
plans as nicely as he ’d hoped. I ’ll warrant 
Monsieur has been horribly disappointed from 
the first, because Louis was so thoroughly 
A merican and did n’t take a scrap of interest 
in his French affairs. He sees plainly that 
Louis is n’t going to be easy to handle. And 
if Louis won’t stand for this restoration busi- 
ness, then ‘the fat ’s in the fire.’ That ’s 
what ’s bothering Monsieur. And he ’s wait- 
ing around to see if he can’t win Louis over 
unconsciously somehow. At least, that ’s how 
I ’ve figured it out.” 

We couldn’t help but agree with her, and 
wondered that we ’d never thought of it by our- 
selves. Resides, the more we thought of it, the 
more we remembered dozens of little incidents 
that seem to confirm it. If we all were n’t so 
busy pegging away at our exams, and so had 
more time to think about this, I feel sure that 
we could come to some definite conclusion 
about it, but as matters stand, I, for one, am 
too bewildered to know what to think. 

184 


SUSPICIONS 


And Louis goes about as happy as a lark, 
unconscious of it all ! 

June 29, 1914. Examinations are over at 
last, and I ’m thankful to say that we all 
passed, except that Carol has a “condition” in 
mathematics that she ’ll have to make up dur- 
ing the summer. Anyhow, it ’s over, and we 
can breathe more freely and look forward to 
vacation. 

Last evening after tea the Imp asked Carol 
and myself to go for a walk with her, as she had 
something important she wanted to tell us. 
We suspected that she ’d thought out some- 
thing else about Louis, so we went quite wil- 
lingly. Otherwise, I ’m bound to confess, 
we ’d have been bored stiff with the prospect of 
spending our time with her. It was quite true. 
She had thought of something new. 

“Girls,” she began, “has it occurred to you 
that if what we suspect about Monsieur and 
Louis is true, it ’s a very serious affair?” 

We said we supposed so, but that we did n’t 
see how we could help it. 

185 


PARADISE GREEN 


“That ’s just it,” she answered. “We ought 
to help it, somehow. I told you once that this 
was a matter that might affect the world, and 
you can easily see now that it is. Ought we 
to simply sit down and let it slide gaily along?” 

“But what on earth can we do about it?” I 
demanded. “Just remember that we ’re noth- 
ing but three young girls, one not even out of 
public school, and that not a soul on earth 
would believe us if we were to make such fools 
of ourselves as to tell what, after all, we only 
suspect.” 

“History has sometimes been in the hands 
of as young people as ourselves,” she remarked. 
I ’m sure I don’t know where the Imp gets 
all her information, and yet somehow I ’m 
bound to believe her. 1 could n’t think of a 
single case where history had been in the hands 
of any one of our age, but I did n’t dare say 
so, because she would probably have promptly 
pointed out half a dozen cases. So I said 
nothing. 

“I have n’t made up my mind what we ought 
186 


SUSPICIONS 


to do,” she went on, “but I ’m sure something 
must be done, and pretty soon, too!” 

“Suppose we begin by telling Father,” I 
suggested. “He has a pretty level head about 
most things.” 

“Pooh!” she scoffed. “He ’d just laugh his 
head off at us, and tell us to run away and 
play and forget all about it. You know Fa- 
ther does n’t take much stock in anything that 
is n’t agriculture.” This was quite true, and 
we saw at once that the Imp had the right of 
it. 

“No, don’t speak to any one yet,” she added. 
“We ’ll keep the secret a while longer, till I ’ve 
thought out a better plan.” 

This morning another queer thing happened. 
As there was no school, we were all sitting on 
the veranda discussing the startling news in 
the paper, the assassination of the Archduke 
of Austria, which happened yesterday. Just 
then Louis came over to ask us to go out in 
the launch. 


187 


PARADISE GREEN 


“What do you think of the news?” he asked. 

We said it was awful, and that we were won- 
dering what would happen next. 

“You ought to have seen Monsieur when he 
read it,” went on Louis, laughing at the recol- 
lection. “He got up, crumpled the paper into 
a ball, and stormed about the place as if he 
were having a fit. I asked him why he was so 
excited about it, and he immediately began to 
reel off a lot about the ‘balance of power’ in 
Europe, — how it would be upset and what 
Austria would be likely to do, where Russia 
would object and how France might be af- 
fected, and a whole lot more that I couldn’t be- 
gin to understand. He ’s a great student of 
international politics, he says, and this news 
seemed to upset him a lot. I ’m sure I can’t 
see why.” 

The Imp poked me so hard in the ribs that 
I almost shrieked aloud, but I saw at once 
what she must be thinking. Are Monsieur’s 
plans upset by this, I wonder? Or are we just 
imagining trouble where there is none? I ’m 
sure I don’t know. But of one thing I ’m 
188 


SUSPICIONS 


certain. I never realized how strange it would 
feel to go off for a picnic up the river in a 
launch run by a boy in a pair of paint bespat- 
tered overalls, whose ancestors sat on the 
throne of France and who might, in his turn, 
become the future ruler of that country. 

Anyhow, I don’t like it. I ’m not happy, 
and I wish things were just as they used to be. 
So does Carol, but I ’m afraid the Imp enjoys 
all the excitement. 


189 


CHAPTER XIV 


A SOLEMN CONCLAVE — AND WHAT CAME 
OF IT 

I T was a hot morning toward the middle of 
July. About nine o’clock three girls might 
have been seen issuing from the Birdseys’ gate, 
two carrying between them a well-filled lunch- 
basket. The third, — none other than the Imp, 
— bore a couple of shawls and two or three 
books, also a thermos-bottle of large propor- 
tions. 

“I know you ’re not awfully keen about this 
picnic,” she was saying to the others, “but it ’s 
only because you ’re a lazy pair and desperately 
afraid of getting a little overheated. It ’ll be 
cool and pleasant down at the old boat-house 
on the river. We can put on bathing-suits 
and have a swim first, and then eat our lunch 
when we feel like it.” 


190 


A SOLEMN CONCLAVE 


“But I don’t see why you ’re so anxious for 
this picnic just to-day,” grumbled Carol. 
“It ’s blazing hot getting there, and we could 
have a much more comfortable lunch at home 
and go for our swim this afternoon.” 

“Yes, and I was planning to do a lot of 
work in the house this morning,” added Sue, 
discouragingly. “I wanted to rearrange my 
room and make that new waist for which 
Mother gave me the material. I hate to have 
things so upset.” 

“Look here!” exploded the Imp. “Didn’t 
I make all the sandwiches and pack the lunch- 
basket and do every blessed thing for this pic- 
nic before you were even out of bed? Do be 
a little grateful, just for once. I had a rea- 
son, and a precious good one, for wanting to 
get off by ourselves to-day. I want to talk 
over something with you.” 

The other two pricked up their ears. 

“What is it?” they demanded, with an in- 
crease of interest. 

“Oh, yes,” scolded the Imp, “you ’re anx- 
ious enough, now that you think there ’s some- 
191 


PARADISE GREEN 


thing worth while in it. I ’ve a great mind 
not to tell you.” 

“Oh, go on, Imp!” soothed Carol. “You 
can’t blame us for being a little grumpy on this 
hot morning. Have you found out something 
new?” 

“I ’ll tell you after we ’ve had our swim,” 
was all the Imp would vouchsafe, and with 
that they were forced to be content. At the 
end of a hot walk across the meadows in the 
blinding sun, they emerged on the river bank 
at the cool little boat-house under the willows. 
Here they donned bathing-suits and splashed 
about in the river for an hour. When they 
were dressed again they lounged on the wide 
platform, amply shaded by one immense wil- 
low that overhung the water. They were com- 
fortable and lazy and cool, and even the two 
reluctant ones acknowledged themselves quite 
happy. 

“Well, let ’s have lunch,” suggested the Imp, 
“and while we eat I ’ll tell you what ’s been in 
my mind for several days.” 

They spread out the sandwiches and fruit, 
192 


A SOLEMN CONCLAVE 

and during the meal the Imp, who had not 
put on her shoes and stockings, sat on the edge 
of the platform and dabbled her feet in the 
water. 

4 'I guess I don’t need to give you three 
guesses as to what I ’m going to speak of,” she 
remarked, between two mouthfuls of a sand- 
wich. 

“Oh, no; it’s Monsieur, of course, and 
Louis,” replied Sue. “Has anything new 
come up ? I have n’t heard of anything. 
Louis has been away at Bridgeton a lot, and 
I imagine he ’s been with that Page Calvin, 
puttering around the old biplane he ’s always 
talking about. I ’ve had a mind to ask Dave, 
who certainly knows, but of course he would n’t 
give me any definite information. I think 
Louis is trying to pluck up courage to begin 
work on that model, but he knows he ’ll have 
another awful fuss with Monsieur when he 
does.” 

“That is n’t what I was going to talk about, 
anyway,” said the Imp. “It may all be true, 
but something more important has been on my 
193 


PARADISE GREEN 


mind for several days. It ’s this : How much 
longer are we going to let this affair go on, 
and do nothing about it?” 

“You ’ve asked that before,” remarked Sue, 
uncomfortably, “and I can’t for the life of me 
see what we can do.” 

“You ’ve made that brilliant remark before,” 
replied the Imp, scornfully, “and it does n’t 
help matters one bit. The point is that things 
have come to such a state that something has 
to be done, and done pretty soon. I had a lit- 
tle talk with Monsieur yesterday, and I ’m go- 
ing to tell you some of the things he said. He 
was sitting out on that seat on the Green about 
five o’clock in the afternoon, reading his pa- 
per. You and Carol were off down at the vil- 
lage getting the mail, and I didn’t have a 
thing to do, so I strolled over to talk to him. 

“He began by saying the news was bad, very 
bad. I was sort of surprised, because I ’d 
looked at the paper every morning, and there 
has n’t been a single exciting thing in it since 
that archduke what ’s-his-name was assassi- 
nated some time ago. I thought that fuss had 
194 


A SOLEMN CONCLAVE 


all blown over, but Monsieur says it hasn’t, 
and that Europe is on the verge of some tre- 
mendous upheaval. He said that that murder 
was only the match that would start the con- 
flagration, or something like that. Anyhow, 
he ended up with these words : 

“ ‘I tell you, petite mademoiselle, I have seen 
it coming this long, long time. Kingdoms will 
fall; republics will totter; the face of Europe 
will be changed. France, France herself, will 
experience a mighty upheaval! It is inevi- 
table!’ ” 

The Imp stopped impressively, and her 
hearers were evidently thrilled. 

“What does he mean ? What can he mean ?” 
she went on, her voice unconsciously rising 
higher and higher, “except that he ’s mixed 
up in all this. If Austria and Russia and 
Germany and England and F ranee are all go- 
ing to be in a big fuss, as he suggested, can’t 
you see what a lovely opportunity it would be 
for him to put through this scheme about re- 
storing the Bourbon monarchy? What else 
can he mean by saying, ‘Republics will totter; 

195 


PARADISE GREEN 


France herself will experience a mighty up- 
heaval’? I tell you, girls, it ’s time this thing 
was reported to the authorities. I ’m sure our 
government could prevent it, if it only knew, 
and then, too, if we really care anything about 
Louis, we ought to protect him, even if he is 
a royalty, — I ’m sure he does n’t want to be 
one! — from being caught in all this mix-up.” 

“But how can we report it to the authori- 
ties?” asked Carol, in a scared voice. “I 
would n’t know the first thing about how to go 
about it.” 

“Then I ’ll tell you,” announced the Imp, 
dramatically. “I don’t believe that in so im- 
portant a thing as this we ought to stop short 
of the very highest authority there is. I pro- 
pose that we write to the President himself. 
And I propose that we do it this very after- 
noon. I ’ve thought it all out. I ’ve even 
brought along the things to do it with.” 

True enough, she produced a fountain-pen 
and some notepaper. So impressed were her 
hearers that Sue could only quaver, in a voice 
that shook with nervousness: 

196 


A SOLEMN CONCLAVE 


“Well, you go on and write it, Bobs. I ’m 
sure you ’ll know what to say. And we ’ll all 
sign it, if you wish. Perhaps that will make it 
look more important. But somehow I feel as 
if we ought to tell Father first.” 

“Then you ’ll spoil everything,” declared the 
Imp. “He would n’t believe it, to begin with, 
and by the time he was convinced it would prob- 
ably be too late. No, this must go off to-night. 
How ought I to address the President of the 
United States, — ‘Dear Sir’ or ‘Your Honor’ 
or what?” 

“If mademoiselle will delay this proceeding 
for a moment,” said a strange voice with star- 
tling unexpectedness, almost at her elbow, “it 
may not be necessary to write the note.” 

The Imp turned about so abruptly that she 
dropped her fountain-pen into the river. The 
two others, fairly turned to stone in their aston- 
ishment and fright, sat motionless. 

It was Monsieur himself. He had emerged 
from the bushes close to the water’s edge, and 
now stood beside the platform of the boat- 
house. As no one of the three sufficiently re- 
197 


PARADISE GREEN 


covered their wits to address him, he went on: 

“I owe you a thousand apologies for this in- 
trusion and for being an unwilling eavesdrop- 
per. I came to a spot among the trees a short 
distance away early this morning, before the 
sun was hot. I have often been there before. 
The nook is a favorite one of mine. I bring 
my book and Mademoiselle Yvonne contrives 
me a little lunch, so that I do not have to go 
back in the heat of the day. I must have 
fallen asleep before you arrived, for I was not 
aware of your proximity till I awoke. Then 
you were eating your luncheon and conversing. 
I was about to make my presence known to 
you, when I caught the drift of your conver- 
sation and astonishment forced me to listen. 
Mesdemoiselles, I know not how you have ar- 
rived at this conclusion, but I take it that you 
think me a conspirator, a — a plotter against 
the government of one of the world’s greatest 
nations. You think it is your duty to report 
me to the authorities of your country. Is it 
not so?” 

It seemed as if the three found it im- 
198 


A SOLEMN CONCLAVE 


possible to break their abashed silence. At 
length the Imp plucked up sufficient courage. 

“Yes, I guess that ’s about it,” she admitted, 
nervously. 

“Would you be so good as to inform me 
on what grounds?” he inquired, with the cour- 
tesy that never failed him. 

The Imp glanced at her companions and 
back again to Monsieur. They were plainly 
caught in a trap. Should she tell what she 
knew, or refuse point blank? For an appre- 
ciable moment she hesitated. It was evident 
that if they put Monsieur in possession of the 
facts, they also would put themselves quite 
completely in his power. That would, on the 
face of it, be a foolish proceeding. Yet how 
could they do less ? There was something 
about the old French gentleman’s perfect 
courtesy and frankness that disarmed even the 
suspicions of the Imp. While she hesitated, 
however, Sue, to her own and every one else’s 
astonishment, took up the cudgels in his be- 
half. 

“I think it is only fair to tell Monsieur what 
199 


PARADISE GREEN 


we have been thinking,” she said in a trembling 
voice. “He may be able to show us that we 
are in the wrong.” 

Monsieur turned to her with a grave bow. 

“I am sure there is some misunderstanding,” 
he declared. “I have heard only enough to 
cause me to suspect that my actions and mo- 
tives here may have been misjudged.” Them 
he turned once more to the Imp. 

“P’tite Mademoiselle Helene, you and I 
have always, so I thought, been the best of 
friends. May I not understand from you the 
cause of this serious suspicion of me?” 

Then and there the Imp, her feet still un- 
consciously dabbling in the river, told Mon- 
sieur in halting fashion the whole history of 
their discoveries about the portrait and their 
consequent conjectures. He listened to it all, 
an inscrutable expression in his eyes, till she 
had finished. When the recital was over he 
stood quite still for several moments, while the 
others waited breathlessly. 

“You are marvelous children — you Ameri- 
cans,” he said at last, “especially petite Helene 
200 


A SOLEMN CONCLAVE 


here! Who would have dreamed that you 
could piece together this story so accurately, 
with so little ground to work on? Yes, so ac- 
curately, as far as its foundation goes, for 
there you are right, astonishingly right. But, 
my good little friends, your premises may be 
right, but your conclusions are most deplorably 
wrong.” 

“Do you mean that we guessed right about 
the portrait and Louis, but were wrong about 
what you intend to do?” demanded the Imp, 
scrambling to her feet and approaching Mon- 
sieur excitedly. 

“I will permit you to judge of that after you 
have heard my story,” replied Monsieur. 
“For I will now put you in possession of the 
whole truth, since you have discovered so much. 
Allow me, if you please, to sit down, while I 
render this accounting of myself.” 


201 


CHAPTER XY 
monsieur’s story 

H E stepped up to the platform and took 
a seat on one end of an old bench that 
flanked one side of it. On the other end sat 
Carol and Sue. The Imp, unable in her ex- 
citement to remain seated anywhere, stood 
near him, her great, blue eyes wide with won- 
der. A catbird sang at intervals in the wil- 
low above them, and the incessant lap-lap of 
the river ran like a musical accompaniment in 
their ears. Not one of the three girls was ever 
to forget this strange moment in their lives, 
not even its beautiful setting. 

“It is hard for me to know just where to 
begin,” Monsieur at length broke the silence 
by saying. “But, as I have said, mes enfants , 
you three have worked out for yourselves a 
difficult problem, so perhaps it is best that I 
commence by telling you where you were right, 
202 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 


and end by pointing out where you erred.' I 
hasten to begin. 

“It may have been a foolish whim of mine 
that I bring with me to this country the three 
portraits that are so dear to me, and especially 
foolish to leave the one unveiled. I had, how- 
ever, my reason for that, but I did not con- 
template that the public was to be admitted to 
my room, as it had to be during our — during 
Louis’ serious accident. All this, however, is 
beside the point. I will begin by telling you 
that I am not, as you have so shrewdly sus- 
pected, this ‘Monsieur de Vaubert’ that I call 
myself here. Truly, ‘de Vaubert’ is a part of 
my name, but it is not all. In France I am 
known as the Marquis Philippe de Vaubert de 
Fenouil. It is a title that is ancient and hon- 
orable. It goes back to the time of Louis 
XIII — yes, and even before that. When our 
Louis discovered the ‘F’ on my handkerchief, 
he was entirely right in his surmises, and I 
was not very astute to leave it lying about. 
N’est-ce-pas V* 

He smiled deprecatingly at his three listen- 
203 


PARADISE GREEN 


ers, with a smile so genuine, so utterly friendly, 
that they found their dark suspicions melting 
away, even before his tale was well begun. 

“To go back to the portrait, however. Yes, 
it is a very beautiful copy of Madame Lebrun’s 
original. It was executed many years ago by 
an exceedingly clever copyist, and I doubt if 
many would know it from the original. It is 
my dearest possession. I will tell you why. 

“My little friend, petite Helene here, by her 
wonderful ingenuity and perception has de- 
duced the conjecture that the ill-used dauphin, 
who should have been Louis XVII, did not die 
in the Temple Tower, as history has recorded 
it. There have, indeed, been many legends to 
that effect. But the truest one, the truth, was 
never known to the world. There are remain- 
ing to-day but two families who are in posses- 
sion of the facts, — my own and that of our 
friends the Meadows, whose real name, as you 
perhaps know, is Mettot. All the rest of that 
wonderful brotherhood which helped to rescue 
him are dead and gone, and the secret is dead 
with them. 


204 


Not one of the three girls was ever to forget this strange moment in their lives 













MONSIEUR’S STORY 


“In order that you may fully understand, I 
will now give you a short account of the real 
story of the dauphin’s rescue. As you know 
through your researches, after Simon the Cob- 
bler was released from the care of the young 
king, the dauphin was placed in a small room 
and completely isolated from the world by 
bolts and bars. Not even his jailers saw him, 
only hearing him speak through an aperture 
in the door. It was the most inhuman treat- 
ment of a child that the world has known, and 
it is a thousand wonders that the boy survived. 
But he did. At the end of an awful six 
months, when Robespierre himself was sent to 
the guillotine and B arras came into power, the 
boy was removed from this horrible incarcera- 
tion and brought to a large, clean room, where 
he was taken care of by two or three guardians 
chosen for their humanity and kindliness. 

“It was at this period that a plot was formed 
by a league of warmhearted, loyal men, — not 
only royalists, but republicans, too, — to rescue 
the dauphin from his long imprisonment and 
send him somewhere, possibly out of the coun- 
205 


PARADISE i GREEN 


try, to live out the rest of his life in peace. 
This league was known as ‘The Brotherhood 
of Liberation/ and the world to-day would 
stand amazed, did it know the members, the 
many famous members, who composed it. It 
has even been whispered that Barras himself 
and the great Napoleon Bonaparte — then 
young, poor, and comparatively unknown — 
were concerned in this plot. All that, how- 
ever, is as it may be. 

“But the main thing is this. The brother- 
hood was accustomed to meet secretly at the 
house of my grandfather, another Marquis de 
Fenouil, in Paris, for he was one of the chief 
leaders and originators of the scheme. Among 
them was a young fellow scarcely more than 
five years older than the dauphin, one Jean 
Mettot, who was deeply and devotedly inter- 
ested in the plan. It seems that he and his 
little foster-sister, Yvonne Clouet, had once 
become acquainted with the dauphin as he 
played in happier years in his garden of the 
Tuileries. Through his intervention, the 
queen, Marie Antoinette herself, had given the 
206 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 


young fellow’s foster-mother quite a large sum 
to defray the overdue taxes on her home and 
thus enable her to keep it for her children. 
So grateful was this poor washerwoman. Mere 
Clouet, and her little daughter Yvonne and her 
foster-son, Jean Mettot, whom she had adopted 
from the foundling hospital, that they had 
vowed to help the poor, ill-used dauphin, even 
to the extent of risking their lives for him. 

“It was Jean Mettot who played one of the 
most important roles in the plan to smuggle 
the dauphin out of the Temple Tower. He 
was employed in that citadel as cook’s assist- 
ant, and thus was able to give aid right on the 
spot, as it were. One of the dauphin’s three 
guardians, Gomin, had also become a member 
of the brotherhood, else the plan could never 
have been carried out. 

“On a given day a sick child who greatly 
resembled the dauphin was smuggled into the 
Tower in a basket of clean linen brought by 
Mere Clouet, laundress for the Temple. This 
child was so ill that there was no possibility of 
his recovery. He was speedily substituted for 
207 


PARADISE GREEN 


the dauphin, who was carried up to the great 
unused attic of the Temple. There he was 
kept for several weeks, unknown to the world 
and tended only by Jean Mettot. When the 
sick child at length passed away, the author- 
ities proclaimed that the dauphin was dead and 
that there was no further need to guard the 
Tower. It was then that the real dauphin was 
smuggled out of the Temple in a basket of 
soiled linen and taken to the home of the 
Clouets, where he remained for several days. 
He was finally removed by some of the mem- 
bers of the brotherhood in high authority, and 
was sent to a distant and obscure corner of 
France to be cared for and brought up, under 
an assumed name, by humble people. The 
brotherhood was then disbanded, being first 
sworn to secrecy by an inviolable oath never 
to reveal what had been done. 

“The boy, Jean Mettot, later became a sol- 
dier in Napoleon’s army and rose to the rank 
of officer. He finally married little Yvonne 
Clouet, and, as you have doubtless surmised, 
this John Meadows whom you know is his de- 
208 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 


scendant, — his grandson, in short. The orig- 
inal Jean Mettot, however, and my grand- 
father, the marquis, kept closely in touch with 
each other for a time, drawn together by their 
mutual love and loyalty to the little dauphin. 
It was Jean Mettot alone who, several years 
after the escape of the dauphin, was summoned 
by that young man to Havre, in order that the 
dauphin might bid farewell to his rescuer. 
The dauphin was sailing for America, never to 
return. He intended, he said, to live there in- 
cognito, in some obscure capacity, as he had no 
desire ever to return to France and certainly 
never wished to rule over that nation. 

“Jean Mettot later attempted to communi- 
cate the news of the dauphin’s departure to my 
grandfather, but found that he had suddenly 
passed away and that his son had assumed the 
title. As Mettot was not certain whether the 
secret had been handed down to the son, he did 
not reveal his news. Many years later, when 
he was a middle-aged man, the notion took hold 
of him to go to America and see if he could 
discover any trace of the dauphin. He had 
209 


PARADISE GREEN 


nothing whatever to assist him, except the as- 
sumed name of the dauphin, ‘Louis Charles 
Durant,’ and the fact that the ship on which 
he had sailed had been bound for a New Eng- 
land port. I think it was Boston. With only 
these two points to aid him, he sailed for Amer- 
ica to engage in his almost hopeless task. 

“In all the years he had heard not so much 
as one syllable from the exile, but even this did 
not discourage him. He began his search in 
New England, shrewdly suspecting that ‘Louis 
Durant’ might not have traveled very far from 
his first landing-place. Many weeks and 
months of absolutely useless and fruitless 
effort followed. No one in any of the large 
cities, or even in the smaller towns, seemed to 
have heard of ‘Louis Charles Durant’ or of any 
one corresponding to his description. It was 
by sheer accident — when Jean Mettot’s horse 
(he made it a practice to travel about on horse- 
back) went lame one stormy night right by 
your Paradise Green — that he was forced to 
ask for a night’s shelter in one of the only two 
houses on the Green at that time. It was on 
210 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 


the door of the Durant house that he knocked, 
and none other than the dauphin himself 
opened it!” 

At this point in the narrative Sue and Carol 
breathed a long sigh of intense interest, and the 
Imp came closer and rested her hand on Mon- 
sieur’s knee. 

“Yes, it is marvelous, is it not?” he went on. 
“There is a proverb which says, ‘Truth is 
stranger than fiction,’ and I have always found 
it so. I leave you to imagine the meeting be- 
tween those two, for they quickly recognized 
each other. After a time Mettot heard the 
whole story from the dauphin. It ran like 
this: 

“He had come to America, landing in New 
England and wandering about for a time, al- 
most penniless and earning his way as he went 
by doing odds and ends of labor for the farm- 
ers. Singularly enough, he enjoyed it. Does 
it seem strange to you, mes enfants, that a king 
should enjoy himself in this fashion? Ah, but 
he noTonger wished to be a king! Not for all 
the riches of the earth would he have gone 
211 


PARADISE GR12EN 


back to his country and assumed his rightful 
title. His terrible childhood ye*J>s in prison 
had given him a longing only for freedom and 
independence of thought and action and a de- 
sire for the most absolute simplicity of life. 

“To Jean Mettot he confided how at length 
he had drifted out to this present farmstead, 
had apprenticed himself to the good farmer 
who owned it, and how for several years he had 
served him faithfully and well for a sum that 
was a mere pittance, but on which he could live 
happily. Two years later the farmer’s daugh- 
ter, who had married some time before, came 
home to her father’s house a widow. After a 
time she and the dauphin became mutually 
attracted to each other and married. Six 
months after their marriage the farmer died, 
leaving his farm to his daughter and her hus- 
band, the unknown dauphin. At the time of 
Jean Mettot’s visit they had a fine little son, 
then ten or twelve years old, and were as happy 
and contented as could well be imagined. 

“Mettot made them quite an extended visit, 
but never did the dauphin reveal to his wife 
£12 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 

that he had ever known Mettot before, or give 
the least hint >4~ his own identity. He said 
that he preferred these things to remain secrets 
forever, buried in the past. He told Mettot 
that he desired his descendants to remain in 
complete ignorance of his past and of their own 
origin. Should a crisis ever arise (now unfore- 
seen by him) , when it would be wise for any of 
his descendants to know their forefather’s his- 
tory, he had prepared for such an emergency a 
document which he had securely hidden away. 
He acquainted Jean with its hiding-place and 
gave him permission to transmit the secret to 
his own descendants. On no account, how- 
ever, was it to be communicated to the dau- 
phin’s descendants, unless the aforementioned 
crisis should arise. 

“Jean Mettot went back to France, and 
never again saw the son of Louis XVI. But 
he continued to keep in touch with ‘Louis 
Charles Durant* of America, and to his own 
son he communicated the strange secret. And 
his son, in turn, communicated it to a son of 
his own, the present Jean Meadows whom you 

ns 


PARADISE GREEN 


know. The dauphin died when he was 
scarcely more than middle-aged, for his consti- 
tution was never robust after the cruel hard- 
ships of his childhood. The son whom he left 
lived to a ripe old age on the same farm, and 
left an heir in his place to continue the line. 
This child, the father of our own Louis, becom- 
ing discontented, as he reached manhood, with 
the life on a simple New England farm, leased 
the property, as you probably know, and went 
out West to make his fortune. He married a 
young western girl on the Canadian frontier, 
and both were mortally injured in a terrible 
accident on one of the Great Lakes’ steamers. 
He had time, however, before he died, to send 
word to France, to this present Jean Mettot, 
leaving their baby son in his care. The two 
families had always kept in touch, though none 
of the present generation had seen each other. 

“I am sure you must be wondering during 
all this recital where I come into the story. It 
is about time for me to make my entrance. 
That is what I am about to disclose. Mettot 
and his daughter Yvonne, on hearing the sad 
2U 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 


news, forsook all and came to America to take 
possession of the baby, which was still being 
cared for at the hospital where its parents had 
died. The Mettot family had not prospered 
with the years, the present Jean’s father hav- 
ing unfortunately lost the modest fortune that 
the original Jean had amassed. They were 
living in a humble way in a small French vil- 
lage, and had practically sacrificed everything 
to come over to America on what they consid- 
ered an almost sacred charge. 

“What, then, was to be done? Jean Mettot 
cast about in his mind for some time, consid- 
ering the matter, but at length came to the 
conclusion that the crisis, spoken of by the 
original dauphin, had now arrived and that the 
time was come to disclose the secret to some 
one. But to whom ? That was the great ques- 
tion. Suddenly he bethought himself of me, 
the present Marquis de Fenouil. He had not 
the slightest idea whether the secret of the 
dauphin’s escape had been transmitted in our 
family, but, taking the risk, he wrote me a full 
account of the whole proceeding, throwing the 
215 


PARADISE GREEN 


present little orphan, so to speak, on my mercy. 

“And now at last I enter. I cannot, indeed, 
give you the slightest idea what this wonderful 
news meant to me. The secret had been trans- 
mitted, — aye, it had become a sacred tradition 
in our family! Many long and fruitless 
searches had we made, — I, my father, and my 
grandfather before us, — to trace, if possible, 
the fate of that lost dauphin. Not one of us 
but would have sacrificed his all to have made 
sure of the after-history of our adored little 
monarch. The portrait that you have seen, 
and those of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, 
which I have always kept veiled, have been our 
most cherished family possessions, especially 
that of the dauphin. We worshipped the 
memory of that heroic little uncrowned mon- 
arch. 

“Can you then understand what it meant to 
me to find myself at last on the track of a true 
descendant of the dauphin? For a time I 
could scarcely credit it. But I knew from my 
grandfather the part played by the original 
Jean Mettot, and I could see no reason to 
21 6 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 


doubt that this tale of his descendant was gen- 
uine. My first impulse was to send for them 
at once, and to bring the child up as my own 
son, till he should be of suitable age to disclose 
the secret to him. But there were a number of 
strong objections to that course. I need not 
mention them all. One is sufficient. For the 
past twenty years I have not been strong. 
My health is only sustained by constant treat- 
ment from physicians, and I spend three quar- 
ters of my time at sanitariums and health re- 
sorts. I am seldom, if ever, in residence at my 
French estate. There were a number of other 
legal reasons why it was not wise for me to 
appear to adopt a child, presumably as my 
heir, which you would scarcely understand, so 
I will not recount them. Suffice it to say that 
I decided on a course which may seem strange 
to you, but which appealed to me as wisest at 
the time. 

“The child was a mere baby, not yet a year 
old. I concluded that for the present it would 
be best to leave him in America, the land that 
his kingly ancestor had chosen to adopt. In 
217 


PARADISE GREEN 

Jean Mettot’s name I leased the same Durant 
farmhouse that belonged to his father and that 
one day would be his own, sent the Mettots 
there with their infant charge, and instructed 
them to bring up the boy in ignorance of his 
real ancestry, until such time as I should deem 
it best to come over to America and take charge 
of his affairs. They have worthily fulfilled 
that charge, having kept me constantly in- 
formed of his growth and progress. 

“In truth, I never supposed the interval 
would be so long before I should find it pos- 
sible to come here. One matter after another, 
— my health chiefly, — has delayed me from 
year to year, though I have planned the trip 
more times than I care to count. During this 
past year, however, the news sent by our 
friends the Mettots proved somewhat disturb- 
ing to me. In order to explain this, I must 
now disclose to you my plans for ‘Louis 
Charles Durant.’ They are, as you will see, 
far from any schemes to restore the Bourbon 
monarchy in France. That would be in direct 
opposition to the wishes of the dead dauphin. 

218 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 

No, I wished him to learn of his wonderful 
ancestry secretly, and only as something to be 
proud of. I wished him to grow up as my own 
son, and, when the time was ripe, I would 
legally adopt him. At first there were several 
obstacles in the way, but these have lately been 
removed. In my own heart, however, he 
would never be my son, but the king who 
should rightfully have ruled over me. I 
wished him to study statecraft and become a 
great political light — a French statesman — and 
perhaps some day make a great name in the 
world. He should be a king of men in deed 
and act, if he could not be in name and right. 
These were my ambitions for him. I felt that 
he must fall in with them.” 

The three listeners stirred uneasily, and the 
catbird in the tree above them uttered its odd, 
mournful cry. Monsieur paused a few sec- 
onds to gaze out over the blue heat-haze on the 
river. Then he went on : 

“It was, therefore, disturbing tidings that I 
began to receive from J ean Mettot. At first 
his reports had been satisfactory in every re- 
219 


PARADISE GREEN 

spect. The boy was upright, manly, and en- 
tirely lovable in nature. Up to his tenth or 
twelfth year he had developed no traits that 
would seem in opposition to my plans for him. 
Rut of late my news of him had been very un- 
welcome to me. To begin with, he openly 
avowed that he cared nothing for France or 
French history and traditions. He was Amer- 
ican to the core, and he actually boasted of it. 
This was not surprising, however, considering 
the fact that he had been born and brought up 
in this land. I promised myself that this diffi- 
culty would be easily overcome later. But 
there was something that troubled me more. 

“The Mettots began to report that the boy 
was developing a strongly mechanical turn of 
mind, that he was constantly working with 
tools and contriving unique devices of his own 
for various mechanical purposes, — in short, 
that he was following directly in the footsteps 
of the unfortunate Louis XVI. It has always 
been my contention that if that monarch had 
devoted himself more to the affairs of his king- 
dom and less to puttering about with tools and 
220 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 

locks, he never would have lost his throne. It 
was an ominous sign to me. But even then I 
hoped that it might prove merely a childish 
whim and fade away into other interests as the 
years progressed. It did not, as you very well 
know. I now feel it to be a family inheritance, 
impossible to overcome. I have resigned my- 
self to it, only praying that in time other mat- 
ters more important may overgrow and stifle 
the tendency. 

“But I also realized that the day could no 
longer be delayed when I must make the trip 
across the ocean and see with my own eyes the 
great-grandson of our long-lost dauphin. 
Perhaps you think it strange that I did not 
send for him to be brought to me. But I had 
my reasons for that, also. I wished to see the 
boy in his natural environment. I wished him 
to know nothing of me. I wished to study him 
and learn his character, watch him at his work 
and play, observe him with his friends, and dis- 
cover for myself his ambitions and tendencies. 
How could I know that I would really care for 
him personally , or he for me, unless I followed 
221 


PARADISE GREEN 


this course ? I loved him already for his ances- 
try, but I wished to love him, if possible, for 
himself. And as I am an old, childless, lonely 
man, I wished him to love me for myself. 
Only by coming here incognito, I deemed, 
could this be accomplished. 

“Well, mes enfants , I came. The history 
of my stay here you are fairly well acquainted 
with. At first, I confess, I was bitterly disap- 
pointed. The boy was a fine, upstanding, 
splendid specimen of American boyhood, but 
he was thoroughly American . He resembled 
in no way that I could see, facially at least, the 
portrait that I had brought with me. That, 
of course, was entirely natural; yet I was dis- 
appointed. At times I thought I could dis- 
cern a fleeting resemblance, but it was always 
fleeting. Only at the time when he was so ill 
did I seem to see in him a resemblance to the 
little dauphin after he had been some time in 
prison.” 

At this point the three girls glanced at each 
other, and, noticing the exchanged look, Mon- 
sieur went on : 

222 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 

“Yes, that is what I meant by the ‘Temple 
look,’ which remark you say Louis overheard. 
But to proceed. The worst disappointment, 
however, was that terrible mechanical trait, a 
trait I found it impossible to overcome and to 
which I have now resigned myself. We had 
our quarrels and disputes over that subject, as 
you know, but at last I felt myself unable to 
cope with so strong a passion. I pass on to 
other things. 

“I need scarcely tell you that during these 
passing months I have come to care deeply and 
tenderly for this boy. He may be different, 
entirely different from my ideal of him, but I 
have come to recognize his fine, genuine manli- 
ness, the entire lovableness of his character. 
His attitude toward me has never deviated 
from the courteous and thoughtful and atten- 
tive, except in the one instance of his boat, and 
I myself was at fault there! I feel that he is 
even developing a sort of fondness for me with 
the passing of time. When you realize that 
he knows nothing whatever of my real identity 
or my object in coming here (I think he rather 
223 


PARADISE GREEN 


suspects both at times), this is all the more 
admirable. As for my feeling for him, I adore 
him, mesdemoiselles, — I can say no more. He 
is the worthy descendant of a king, even though 
he be not French in anything but ancestry. 

“You can easily see, then, what it meant to 
me when he made that astonishing announce- 
ment a few weeks ago. Could anything he 
more unutterably terrible for me to hear than 
that this most dangerous of all careers should 
be the chosen one of my adopted son-to-be? 
It is incredible to me, even yet. I am praying 
daily that the whim shall pass from him. In 
the first shock of it I thought that the time had 
come for me to disclose the truth to him, 
whether I was ready to do so or not. Yet on 
second thought I again hesitated. There is 
one link in the chain that is still missing. It 
is for that I am waiting, for I do not wish him 
to be made acquainted with the secret till I 
can lay the complete evidence before him. 

“You remember, perhaps, that I spoke of a 
document, prepared by the dauphin and hid- 
den by him in some spot, the secret of which 
224 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 

lie disclosed only to the original Jean Mettot. 
It was his wish that the document be found and 
delivered to his descendants, should a crisis ever 
arise when it would be deemed necessary to 
disclose the secret to them. That document, I 
am sorry to say, we have as yet been unable to 
discover. The original Mettot wrote the di- 
rections for finding the hiding-place in a sealed 
letter and left it with his son, who, in turn, left 
it in care of our John Meadows. Unfortu- 
nately, when this John Meadows and his 
daughter came to America they failed to bring 
the letter with them, because they supposed 
that they would return at once to France. 
More unfortunately still, since they have been 
here their little home was burned to the ground, 
and the letter, of course, disappeared in the 
conflagration. Meadows himself never read 
the letter, and he has only a vague remem- 
brance that his grandfather once said in his 
hearing, when he was only a small child, that 
he believed the hiding-place to be somewhere 
near a chimney. That is absolutely the only 
clue we have had to work on. 

225 


PARADISE GREEN 

“I need not tell you that the search for that 
document has been unceasing since I first ar- 
rived, and even before that. Every nook and 
cranny, from attic to cellar, has been ransacked 
without the slightest result. Unless the house 
itself is torn down, I see no possible hope of 
finding it. However, I do not yet utterly de- 
spair; and when the document does come to 
light, I will make the great disclosure to Louis 
and formulate my future plans. Circum- 
stances may be such, however, that I shall have 
to put him in possession of the secret before the 
document is found. I should be sorry for 
that, as I wish him to feel that our evidence 
concerning this strange story is complete. 

“And now, my friends, you know it all. I 
have hidden nothing from you. I have shown 
you my inmost heart. I have only one re- 
quest — that you still keep this thing a secret 
from every one, especially from Louis.” 

He stopped, and there was silence. The 
catbird above them had flown away. The river 
was unruffled by the slightest breath. The 
water had ceased its lap-lap . The afternoon 
226 


MONSIEUR’S STORY 


stillness was complete. Carol and Sue sat mo- 
tionless in their corner, their hands clasped, 
their eyes wide and intent. 

Suddenly the Imp flung herself to the 
ground and buried her face on the old French 
gentleman’s knees, a passion of choking sobs 
shaking her little body. He laid his hand on 
her head and murmured in a startled voice : 

“Little one, little one! What is it that 
troubles you?” 

“O Monsieur, Monsieur!” she gasped. 
“What a little beast I ’ve been! Can you ever 
forgive me? How I have misjudged you!” 


CHAPTER XVI 

AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

J ULY 27, 1914. It is ten days since that 
strange afternoon down at the old boat- 
house on the river. I have been living in a 
kind of dream ever since. I cannot somehow 
believe that I ’m just plain, ordinary Susan 
Birdsey, living on out-of-the-way little Para- 
dise Green, to whom nothing unusual ever has 
or ever will happen. Paradise Green is no 
longer the prosaic place it was. It is the secret 
spot chosen by history as the home of one of her 
most romantic characters. Who would ever 
have thought if? And I, Susan Birdsey, am 
one of the three humble persons Fate has 
chosen to be the sharer of this marvelous secret. 

I cannot help thinking of what Miss Cul- 
lingford said when she suggested that we keep 
a journal, — that some journals had been inter- 
228 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

esting and valuable additions to history. 
That, at least, is what I never supposed mine 
could possibly be. And yet, if she could only 
see it now ! But she never will, of course, nor 
any one else, for I have promised Monsieur 
that I will never, without his permission, reveal 
a single word of what he has told us. This is 
not, he says, because it would harm any one, or 
make the slightest change in the world’s affairs, 
but because of the poor “lost dauphin’s” wish. 

We three have talked of it incessantly, — 
Carol, the Imp, and I. Somehow the wonder 
of it never grows any less. That such a thing 
could happen here, here on little Paradise 
Green! And yet the Imp says it is no new 
thing in history for an exiled king to hide him- 
self away in a strange country amid the hum- 
blest surroundings. Where does she get all 
these historical facts, anyway? Even Carol, 
who is fond of history and reads a lot of it, 
does n’t know half as much about things as the 
Imp does. I am changing my opinion of the 
Imp very much lately. I used to think she 
was such a scatter-brained, harum-scarum 
229 


PARADISE GREEN 


child, without a serious thought in her head. 
But I guess we really did n’t know her then, 
and misjudged her a lot. 

But it ’s Louis, our Louis, who seems to us 
the strangest, the most impossible thing to be- 
lieve. Before we heard Monsieur’s story we 
imagined this about him, but half the time we 
told ourselves it wasn’t, it couldn’t be true. 
We must be on the wrong track, we said. 
Now we know that it is all true, and Louis 
can never be “our Louis,” the friend we ’ve 
always known, any more. How could he be? 
To begin with, he ’s going to be the adopted 
son of the Marquis de Fenouil (I hope that ’s 
the way to spell it!), a great nobleman of 
France, and go away to France and inherit a 
title, and probably we ’ll never see him again 
as long as we live. In addition, as if that 
were n’t enough, he ’s not the plain American 
boy we always thought him, but the great- 
great-grandson of a king of France. And we 
know this, even if the rest of the world does 
not, and can never, never feel on the same 
footing with him again. Not that that will 
230 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

make any difference, I suppose, if he ’s to go 
away from here for good. But it ’s like losing 
your brother, — like losing Dave, for instance, — 
only Dave never has been, especially of late 
years, as friendly and near to us as Louis has 
been. 

We have seen almost nothing of Louis since 
that day with Monsieur. He has been to 
Bridgeton every day, spending the time, I ’m 
perfectly certain, with that Page Calvin and 
his miserable aeroplane. It makes me per- 
fectly sick to think of it, especially since Mon- 
sieur has told us everything. By the way, I 
can’t get out of the habit of calling him “Mon- 
sieur,” but it ’s just as well, I suppose, because 
we ’re not supposed to know he ’s anything 
else. Of course Louis does n’t realize what all 
this means to the old gentleman, but if he only 
knew that it was fairly breaking his heart, I do 
believe he ’d be willing to give up the danger- 
ous scheme and take to something else. I feel 
sure Monsieur suspects why he ’s away at 
Bridgeton, but he never says a word to us, — 
j ust suffers in silence. 

ssi 


PARADISE GREEN 

The Imp sees Monsieur and talks to him 
very often as he sits on his favorite bench on 
the Green. He sits there a great deal, on that 
bench under the big elm, and reads his paper 
and watches us play tennis. Sometimes we 
all go over and talk to him, but he never says 
a word about what he told us that day on the 
river, — not, at least, when we ’re all together 
with him. Pie does speak of it sometimes to 
the Imp when they ’re alone. She says that 
to-day he told her that the situation in Europe 
is very grave. Pie is certain that Austria is 
about to declare war on Serbia, and that if she 
does, the whole of Europe will be involved. 
There will be the most awful conflict the world 
has ever known, if this happens. 

The Imp asked him if France was likely to 
go into it, too, and he said he did not see how 
this could be avoided; France would always do 
what was right. But here ’s the worst. He 
says that if France declares war, he will have 
to return immediately, since important political 
matters will demand it, and he intends to tell 
Louis the whole truth and take him back with 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

him. That piece of news seems perfectly 
ghastly to us, and yet I honestly don’t see how 
Monsieur can do anything else. 

I felt to-day, after hearing this from the 
Imp, that I simply must understand this Euro- 
pean situation for myself, so I got the daily 
paper and read up everything I could find 
about it. But I have to confess that I was not 
much wiser after I had read it than I was be- 
fore. So I went to the Imp and asked her if 
she could explain the thing. She said: 

“Why, it ’s this way. Monsieur has told me 
all about it. Austria considers that she ’s got 
to make Serbia get down on her knees and beg 
pardon, because an Austrian archduke was 
killed there. So Austria ’s sent Serbia a note 
proposing all sorts of concessions that Serbia 
will never stand for in the world. The Ser- 
bians answered that note yesterday, and were 
willing to make whatever reparation they could 
about the archduke, but they won’t hear of 
some of the other things. Austria wants the 
‘whole hog,’ or nothing, so of course she ’ll take 
this opportunity to declare war. Russia has 


PARADISE GREEN 

always sort of sympathized with the Serbians, 
so if they get into trouble, she ’s going to give 
them a hand. And Monsieur says she ’s al- 
ready mobilizing her troops. Germany is in 
a compact always to help Austria out, so that ’s 
where she comes in. Monsieur says Ger- 
many ’s been waiting forty years for this op- 
portunity to get gay and let loose on Europe, 
so she is n’t going to let such a lovely chance 
as this pass.” (These are the Imp’s words, 
not Monsieur’s, I feel certain!) “And France 
has a compact to be an ally of Russia, and 
England ’s in that, too, so you can easily see 
what a beautiful parrot-and-monkey time it ’s 
going to be !” 

The situation is a little clearer to me now, 
I ’ll admit, but the whole thing makes me ter- 
ribly depressed. 1 ’m glad I don’t see much 
of Louis now. I simply cannot be with him 
and act naturally, as if nothing were out of the 
ordinary. I cannot face him and think who he 
really is, and keep the wonder and pain and 
bewilderment of it out of my expression. So 
perhaps it ’s a good thing he ’s away so much. 

234 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

August 1 , 1914. Austria declared war on 
Serbia a few days ago. The Imp, in a terrible 
state of excitement, rushed up to my room with 
the paper that morning to announce the news. 
But we ’ve had worse since, and it ’s all 
turning out as Monsieur said it would. We 
— that is, the Imp, Carol, and I — were all 
going into Bridgeton to the circus to-day, 
but we Ve given it up. None of us seemed 
to have the heart for that kind of a lark 
in the face of what is going on and what it 
means for Louis. He still unsuspectingly 
goes off to see Page Calvin every day, and 
never gives the European situation a thought, 
I ’m certain. Of course he can’t for a moment 
imagine that it will have any bearing on his 
affairs. 

The Imp told us to-day that Miss Yvonne 
is not a bit well. She ’s had a nervous break- 
down of some kind. Monsieur thinks it ’s be- 
cause of this awful state of affairs in Europe, 
and also because they can’t seem to find the 
least trace of those papers. That has been 
preying on her mind for a long time. She 


PARADISE GREEN 


thinks it ’s her fault and her father’s that they 
did n’t bring that letter with them from France. 
It really was n’t, because they came away in 
such a hurry, without knowing much about the 
actual circumstances. Nevertheless, she is 
continually worrying about it. 

We told Mother she was ill, and Mother and 
the Imp went over to see her yesterday. They 
took her some grape conserve and some raised 
biscuits we ’d just baked, and they said she 
seemed awfully grateful for the attention. 
The Imp said she seemed more human than she 
ever had before, and more communicative, too, 
— not about any of their secret affairs, of 
course, but on general topics. She says her 
eyes bother her a lot, so the Imp offered to 
come over every day and read the paper to 
her, and she actually said she ’d like it. 

Louis’s birthday comes in a few days — on 
August fourth — and we ’re planning a little 
surprise-party for him. We ’re going over 
there early in the morning, — Dave, Carol, the 
Imp, and I, — and just casually ask him to 
walk across the fields to the old boat-house 
236 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

with us. When we get there we ’re going to 
suggest to him that he take us out in the launch 
for a while. And when we get back we ’re go- 
ing to produce a big spread that we ’ll have 
previously hidden in the boat-house, and have 
a regular feast on the platform. In the mid- 
dle of it all we ’re going to present Louis with 
a gold watch-fob that we all chipped in for, 
and Monsieur is going to give him the most 
beautiful watch. Monsieur, of course, is to be 
a member of this party. The Imp asked him, 
and he seemed delighted with the idea. Under 
ordinary circumstances, I would consider it the 
greatest lark, but as things are, it seems as if I 
could hardly endure it — to sit there all day and 
look at Louis and think what he ’s soon going 
to learn from Monsieur. 

August 4, 1914. The worst has happened, 
the very worst! It makes me sick beyond 
words to read what I last wrote here — about 
having a surprise-party, a picnic! It was a 
surprise-party right enough, but the surprise 
was very much on our side, after all. We all 
237 


PARADISE GREEN 


started over for Louis’s this morning, just as 
we ’d planned. We ’d been up at six o’clock, 
carrying the “feed” (as the Imp calls it) down 
to the boat-house, and everything was quite 
ready. At the last minute Dave could n’t go 
over with us, because F ather had some urgent 
errand he wanted him to attend to in Bridge-^ 
ton, but he promised to join us later. 

I confess that we were n’t any of us as hilari- 
ous over this party as we ’d ordinarily be, for 
we all feel a lot depressed about this thing. 
But we had n’t a suspicion of what was ahead 
of us. 

We ’d hoped to see Monsieur or Louis 
around outside, but no one was anywhere in 
sight. So we knocked at the front door, and 
Louis came and opened it. 

In all my life I ’ll never forget how that 
poor fellow looked. He was stricken ! I can’t 
think of any other word that expresses it so 
well. He did n’t seem surprised to see us, but 
instead of inviting us inside, said : 

“Come out on the Green and sit on our old 
238 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

bench for a few minutes, will you? I Ve some- 
thing to tell you.” 

We followed him in dead silence, and we felt 
that something awful must have happened. 

“Have you seen the morning papers?” Louis 
asked, when we were seated. 

“No,” I said. “What ’s the matter?” 

“France has declared war!” he answered. 

Somehow he did n’t need to say another 
word. We knew the whole thing. It had 
come at last. There wasn’t one of us who 
could think of a word to say, not even the Imp, 
though she ’s usually quick enough with a reply. 
But this time she seemed struck dumb. 

After we ’d all sat there for what seemed like 
six months, Louis said : 

“I ’ve heard the whole story from Mon — I 
mean from the marquis. I know that you 
know it, too. He told me so. I understand 
that he did n’t intend to tell me to-day, — that 
you were going to give me a surprise-party for 
my birthday. Thank you, girls, all the same. 

I— I — ” 


289 


PARADISE GREEN 


He could n’t say any more just then, but sat 
staring away at nothing. 

“It was the news in the paper that changed 
it all,” he went on at last. “Germany has in- 
vaded French territory and violated the neu- 
trality of Belgium, so of course the war is 
inevitable. The marquis is much excited and 
has to go back at once to offer his estates and 
his assistance to the government. I shall go 
with him.” 

He said all this in the strangest way, in a 
sort of dull, monotonous voice, as if he ’d just 
learned it by heart and had n’t the slightest in- 
terest in it. It was the Imp who spoke first. 

“Louis,” she said, very quietly, “were you 
sorry to hear about — about that other matter?” 

He did n’t answer for a minute, and just sat 
looking off into space again. Finally he said, 
in the same monotonous voice : 

“It ’s killing me!” 

“But, Louis,” I found the courage to say, 
“it ’s really a wonderful thing. You ought to 
be proud of it.” 

240 



“Louis,” she said very quietly, “were you sorry to hear about — 
about that other matter?” 


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AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

“Proud of what V 3 he demanded fiercely. 

“Of — of being the descendant of a French 
king,” I said. 

“I ’ve been proud as Lucifer all my life to 
be an American ” he answered. “What are 
French kings to me ? And I am an American, 
too! Not a thing he ’s said can make me any- 
thing else. I don’t care if my ancestor did 
come here from France. Every American’s 
ancestors came from somewhere else, if you go 
back far enough. That does n’t alter things.” 

“Yes, that is perfectly true. You are just 
as much an American as ever,” I admitted, 
thinking of that side of it for the first time. 
“But if that ’s so, I can’t see what you’ re so 
down-hearted about.” 

“What do you think it means to me to give 
up all my plans and ambitions in life and go 
over to France and become a French nobleman 
by adoption ; to devote myself to every interest 
but the one I ’m wrapped up in and fitted for 
during all the rest of my days?” 

“But, Louis,” began the Imp, “if you feel 
so — strongly about it, why do you have to do 
241 


PARADISE GREEN 


it ? Could n’t you persuade Monsieur to let 
you do something else? He ’s simply devoted 
to you. Surely he ’d be willing to meet your 
wishes, somehow.” 

“You don’t understand,” answered Louis. 
“Can’t you see that I ’m under an absolute 
obligation to meet his wishes? I ’d be an un- 
grateful brute, if I did anything else. You 
must realize what his ancestor did for mine. I 
would n’t be in existence to-day, if it had n’t 
been for what the original marquis did to help 
the — the dauphin to escape. Why, I ’m also 
under a tremendous obligation to the Mettots 
for the same reason. And then, there ’s some- 
thing else you don’t know about that makes it 
even worse. I haven’t a cent in this world, 
nor ever have had, that hasn’t been supplied 
by Mon — by the marquis.” 

“You had this farm, didn’t you?” I inter- 
rupted, for Louis has always told us that this 
farm was his, or at least would be his when he 
came of age. That was all the Mettots had 
ever told him about his affairs. 

“Oh, yes; so I thought!” he answered bit- 
242 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

terly. “But of course I did n’t know that my 
father had died deeply in debt, leaving this 
place mortgaged to the hilt. I would never 
have owned a penny of it if the marquis had n’t 
stepped in and redeemed it, paying every cent 
of the expenses of my bringing up. Why, the 
very pocket-money I ’ve had was his, and I 
always supposed it was the proceeds from the 
sales of our garden-truck. Oh, I ’m tied hand 
and foot by the deepest of obligations! 
There ’s nothing else to do. I ’m helpless.” 

We all were silent for a long time after that. 
I, for my part, couldn’t think of one thing 
more to say. Louis was resigned and quiet 
and utterly hopeless. And to try and comfort 
him and put the best side on things was a per- 
fect farce. None of us attempted it. 

“When do you go?” I asked, presently. 

“In a week or so,” he said. “As soon as 
things can be arranged. Monsieur — I mean 
the marquis — has asked me to beg that we be 
excused from the surprise-party, in view of 
what has happened. I don’t know what he 
means by that, but probably you do. He also 
243 


PARADISE GREEN 


wished me to explain to you that you are at 
liberty to tell any one you wish that I am to 
go to France to become his adopted son, but 
that the other secret you will always kindly 
keep to yourselves.” 

“Louis,” said the Imp, “we were going to 
have a surprise-party for you at the boat-house 
to-day because it was your birthday, but I 
guess the surprise is on us. Anyhow, here ’s a 
little trifle we wanted to give you, but we 
had n’t intended to present it in this way. 
You ’ll understand, though.” 

She handed Louis the watch-fob, and he 
took it in a sort of dazed, unseeing way. But 
he thanked us a lot, adding that Monsieur had 
given him the watch after they had had their 
interview. 

“I ’ll never forget you,” he said, “and you 
need n’t think because I have to go to France 
that I ’m not going to see you again, either. 
I ’m coming back here as often as I can man- 
age it, and I ’ll be the same old Louis. You ’ll 
see!” This thought seemed to give him the 
only comfort he had. 

244 


AUGUST FOURTH, 1914 

“But what about the Meadows ?” asked 
Carol. 

“Oh, they ’re going, too, of course,” Louis 
answered. “Their mission here is over now. 
The marquis is going to close the house, but 
he ’s granted, as a concession to me, that he ’ll 
keep it, and not sell it or even rent it to any one 
else. Then I can come back to ic once in a 
while, and live in the old way for a time. 
He ’s an awfully good sort, I will say, and is 
only doing this because he sees 1 ’m all broken 
up over things. Well, I must go back to help 
him send off despatches and pack. It ’s a 
hateful job. Come over and see Aunt 
Yvonne. She ’s upset over this, and instead of 
feeling joyful, as I should suppose she would, 
is quite miserable over something. I can’t un- 
derstand what it is, though.” 

Louis went off directly across the Green. 
It was heartbreaking to watch him. 

But the Imp says that one thing is certain. 
They P ly have n’t told Louis about those 
papers that can’t be found. 


245 


CHAPTER XVII 


THE IMP MAKES A LAST DISCOVERY 

BURNING August sun shone down piti- 



aA. lessly on the parched brown grass and 
dusty roads about Paradise Green. The 
great elms stood absolutely motionless in the 
stifling air. Into this merciless atmosphere, 
quite early in the morning of August 12, 
emerged three girls, bound for the home of 
Louis Durant. 

“Isn’t it awful!” moaned Carol, perspira- 
tion streaming down her face, as they plodded 
on in the blazing sun. “This terrific heat has 
lasted a week, and there isn’t a sign of let- 
up yet!” 

“And to think that poor Miss Yvonne has 
to tear up the house and pack at such a time as 
this !” echoed Sue. “She is n’t a bit well, either. 
I ’m awfully glad she ’s letting us help her. I 


246 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

never supposed she would, but she must be kind 
of desperate, with their servant gone. She ’s 
fine to have let her go, though, for the servant 
said her son had to join the army, and she 
might never see him again, if she did n’t leave 
for France at once.” 

“Yes, it is great of Miss Yvonne to struggle 
through this alone,” put in the Imp, “but I 
still don’t see why Monsieur didn’t want her 
to get help from the village, except that he 
didn’t wish strangers to pry around and ask 
questions at this time, I suppose.” 

They reached the gate and turned into the 
yard. Monsieur was sitting under a tree, 
reading a paper and striving to imagine that 
he was as cool as possible in its shade. Louis 
was in the house, helping Miss Yvonne. 

“Come in, girls!” he called through an open 
window. “We are precious glad to see you. 
Can you help us pack these books ?” 

The tone strove to be his usual, careless, 
care-free one, but it was patently anything but 
that. Not one of the girls but realized the 
effort he was making. 

247 


PARADISE GREEN 


They entered the room, donned dust-caps 
and aprons that they had brought with them, 
and entered on the work with assumed zest. 
They were in Miss Yvonne’s room on the 
ground floor, and the dismantling process had 
begun to be complete. The bed was taken 
down, the bookshelves emptied and their con- 
tents piled on the floor, and the furniture was 
shrouded in sacking. Little remained to be 
packed, except the contents of a big closet built 
into one wall. Miss Yvonne was elsewhere, so 
the young folks had the room to themselves. 

“Isn’t the weather awful!” groaned Carol, 
for the second time in ten minutes. 

“The news in the paper is worse!” com- 
mented Louis. 

“Oh, what is it ?” chorused the girls. “None 
of us have had time to read the paper to-day.” 

“The Germans are demolishing Belgium. 
They ’ve entered France at several points and 
are bound straight for Calais and Paris. It 
seems as if nothing could stop them. They ’re 
walking away with everything. They ’re hid- 
eously prepared for this, and not one of the 
248 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 


other nations is. It makes my blood boil! 
Oh, if I could only do something, instead of 
just going over to France and watching the 
show ! But I suppose Monsieur would n’t hear 
of it.” 

“Louis, you mustn’t get into this fight. 
You ’re too young!” exclaimed Sue. 

“Yes, that ’s what he says,” muttered Louis, 
viciously scrubbing a book with a dust-cloth. 
“But I ’m seventeen; and I don’t agree with 
him. I Ve lost all interest in life, anyhow. 
Why should n’t I go in and smash a few of the 
enemy’s heads?” 

The three girls shuddered, but did not an- 
swer. 

“There !” cried the Imp, glad to change the 
subject. “I Ve finished these books. Now 
what else is there to do here, Louis ?” 

“Aunt Yvonne said that closet was to be 
emptied and all the things piled on the floor.” 

The Imp straightway dived into the closet, 
calling back : 

“I ’ll hand the things out, and you all put 
them where they are to go.” 

249 


PARADISE GREEN 


She began hurling out packages and bundles 
in an endless stream, for it seemed as if the 
closet had been used for years as a storage- 
place, and that the contents had seldom been 
moved. 

“My, but there are a lot of them!” coughed 
the Imp, choking with dust. 

“Yes, Aunt Yvonne said she was rather 
ashamed of this closet,” said Louis. “She ’s 
used it as a catch-all for years, and most of 
these bundles are things she never has any use 
for, yet won’t under any circumstances give or 
throw away.” 

“We have the same kind of a closet at home,” 
remarked Carol. “Mother says she does n’t 
know how she ’d get along without it, — I mean 
the kind of place where you stow things away 
that you hardly expect to touch again.” 

“So have we,” echoed Sue. 

They worked for a time in silence. At last 
the Imp, dusty and cobwebby, tossed out a 
final bundle, with the remark : 

“That ’s the last, I guess, except some scraps 
of wrapping-paper and so on. I ’ll just look 
250 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

among these to see that there ’s nothing 
more.” 

They heard her grubbing about for a mo- 
ment or two, and then came a stifled exclama- 
tion. 

“What ’s the matter?” cried every one simul- 
taneously. 

“Somebody bring a candle!” commanded the 
Imp. “There ’s something queer here!” 

Louis rushed away to get one, and was back 
in a jiffy. 

“Here it is,” he said, handing it in to the 
Imp. While she lit it the three crowded into 
the doorway to see whatever was to be revealed. 

“It ’s this hole,” explained the Imp, holding 
the candle to a space about six inches in diam- 
eter, near the base of the wall. “It was back 
of a pile of bundles, and I guess it must have 
been made by mice or rats, for the gnawed bits 
are lying all around. It must be rather recent, 
too, for it looks so. My hand slipped into it a 
moment ago, and the boarding came loose as I 
was trying to get it out. I think it must be 
because it was so old and rotten. Anyhow, it 
251 


PARADISE GREEN 


pulled away, and I just caught a glimpse of 
something behind it that seemed strange.” 

Louis crowded into the closet at this, and 
gave the board a wrench. It fell away, dis- 
closing a sight that made the four stare with 
surprise. 

“Why, it ’s a fireplace !” cried the Imp, pok- 
ing her head in as Louis pulled away another 
board. “A great, immense fireplace, even big- 
ger than the one in your living-room.” 

It was nothing less. Each girl took a turn 
at poking her head into the open space, and all 
were amazed at the breadth of the great chim- 
ney-place, which still contained the andirons 
and curious old hooks and cranes of bygone 
years. 

“I must tell the others !” cried Louis. “I ’m 
sure they ’ll be interested in this.” And he 
rushed away to inform them. 

While he was gone, the Imp suddenly 
emerged from the closet in great excitement. 

“I have an idea,” she whispered to the others. 
“I may be crazy, but I believe we ’re on the 
track of the hiding-place of those papers. 

252 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

Don’t you remember what Monsieur said about 
a chimney V* 

The two girls looked startled. Before they 
could discuss the matter, however, back came 
Louis with Monsieur and the Meadows couple 
behind him. 

“It ’s perfectly clear to me,” Louis was ex- 
plaining to them, “that at some time or other, 
pretty far back, some one had the great dong 
kitchen’ in this house made into two rooms, and 
the original walls and fireplace were entirely 
boarded-up and concealed. I always thought 
it rather strange that this house, which is ex- 
actly the same build and design as the old Cas- 
well place, for instance, or a dozen others 
around here, should be entirely without that 
immense dong kitchen,’ as they call it, that all 
the rest have. You know it ’s the original 
kitchen of the former N ew Englanders. They 
used it as kitchen and dining-room and every- 
thing. The fireplace is the biggest in the 
house, for often they would have an ox drag 
into the room a great log that would entirely 
fill the chimney-place. Somebody has evi- 
253 


PARADISE GREEN 


dently had that room made into two smaller 
ones, with no fireplace at all. Queer thing to 
do. I wonder why they did it?” 

In his interest in this explanation, Louis 
had not appeared to notice the evident excite- 
ment of Monsieur and old John Meadows and 
Miss Yvonne. Now he was thunderstruck 
when Monsieur asked him if it was possible to 
pull down the boarding around the fireplace. 

“Why, of course,” exclaimed Louis, much 
astonished. “I have some tools I could use, 
and it would n’t take much strength, but 
what ’s the use of demolishing it now? It will 
make an awful mess, and there probably is n’t 
much beyond what we ’ve already seen, any- 
how. It would be a good thing, perhaps, to 
have this fine old room restored while we ’re 
away, but I don’t see any use in beginning it 
now.” 

The marquis, trembling so that he was forced 
to support himself by leaning on a packing- 
case, spoke with more decision than his hearers 
had ever heard before : 


254 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

‘‘Tear down the woodwork, Louis. It is my 
wish. There may be an excellent reason.” 
Without further protest, Louis went to work. 

The noontide sun grew hotter and hotter, 
but the company in that curiously littered room 
did not notice it. Not a word was spoken as 
they watched Louis, but a breathless suspense 
gripped them all, — all, that is, except Louis. 
To him it was only a useless whim of Mon- 
sieur’s that he was obeying, and he was secretly 
rather irritated. He found, during the course 
of his labor, that the chimney-place ran clear 
behind the walls into the next room, which was 
that of old Mr. Meadows, but even this did not 
daunt the marquis. 

“Tear down the wall between, if you can. 
Knock it down, break it down, somehow. I do 
not care, so long as we free the chimney !” 

Before Louis was finished, the place looked 
as if it had suddenly been subjected to an air- 
raid and earthquake combined, but no one 
cared. By that time even Louis had begun to 
feel a vague suspicion that they were on the 
255 


PARADISE GREEN 

track of something. When the fireplace at 
last stood free amid the surrounding debris, he 
stepped aside, remarking: 

“There! That ’s about all I can do, I think. 
That was a clever piece of work — the way this 
other room has been entirely concealed. Not 
one of us has ever suspected that it was here, 
though I suppose if we ’d been any sort of 
architects, we might have done so. ,, 

“Oh, here are the old Dutch ovens!” cried 
the Imp, rushing forward to examine the curi- 
ous little iron doorways in the sides of the 
chimney-place. “I saw the same thing in the 
Caswell house. They used to bake bread in 
those, when the chimney became good and 
hot.” 

She pulled open one of them and thrust in 
her hand. 

“Gracious! There’s something in here!” 
she ahnost shouted, hauling out a small iron 
box covered with the rust and dust and cob- 
webs of what must have been a century in 
hiding. 

“Give it to me! Give it to me!” cried old 
256 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

John Meadows, striding forward and fairly 
snatching it from her grasp. “It is the one, 
the very one my grandfather spoke of, and in 
the chimney , just as I have always thought he 
said.” 

With tears of excitement in his eyes, he took 
the box and placed it in the hands of the mar- 
quis. Miss Yvonne, sobbing quietly in the 
intensity of her relief, sat down on a small 
packing-case and hid her face in her hands. 
The three girls, understanding something of 
this strange discovery, stood by, breathless in 
their excitement and interest. Only Louis, to 
whom the whole proceeding was a dark mys- 
tery, stared at them all, open-mouthed and 
questioning. 

Monsieur took the box and placed it in 
Louis’s hands. 

“Can you open it for us?” he asked. “I 
suppose we might find the key, if we hunted 
long enough, but I cannot wait for that. Open 
it without a key, if that is possible.” 

“I suppose I could get it open with an ax,” 
remarked Louis, examining the box carefully, 
257 


PARADISE GREEN 


“or even with a hammer and chisel, if you ? re 
not afraid that the contents may be hurt.” 

“It will not harm it, I am sure,” replied 
Monsieur, and Louis brought the necessary 
tools. 

It took a long while to break the lock, for the 
workmanship was stout and strong. But at 
last this was accomplished, and Louis handed 
the box to Monsieur for further investigation. 
They all pressed around him eagerly, as he 
opened the lid. It contained nothing but a 
paper, folded, tied, and sealed — a paper so 
faded, stained, and tender that they scarcely 
dared touch it, lest it fall apart. Monsieur 
took it out with extreme care, broke the 
seal, and handed the unread document to 
Louis. 

“Read it,” he said. “It concerns you, and 
you alone. It is your right to have the first 
reading of it. It is a sacred message, trans- 
mitted to you through the years by your great- 
grandfather, the lost dauphin.” 

“Shall I read it aloud?” inquired Louis, in a 
voice of hushed awe. 


258 



Louis began to read aloud, stopping often to decipher a word 



THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

“If it pleases you to do so,” replied the mar- 
quis. 

Louis cleared his throat nervously, and be- 
gan to read aloud in French, stopping often to 
decipher a word that was blurred by the stains 
of time. As the two girls, Carol and Sue, 
could understand little or nothing of what he 
read, they could only watch curiously the ex- 
pression on the faces of the other auditors. 
But before Louis had read far, that expression 
became singularly different on each of those 
five eager countenances. Miss Yvonne leaned 
forward from her packing-box, her eyes star- 
tled and unbelieving. Old John Meadows 
ruffled his white hair distractedly with his 
hands and muttered, “What? what?” in Eng- 
lish, and other expressions in French. The 
Imp’s big blue eyes fairly danced with amaze- 
ment, and pleased amazement, at that. Mon- 
sieur stood listening, his hands clenched, his 
head thrust forward, his eagle-like gaze intent, 
unbelieving, stricken. Only Louis read on 
stolidly, as if the content had not yet registered 
itself on his mind. 


259 


PARADISE GREEN 

Suddenly he threw down the paper and 
shouted, “Hurrah ! hurrah!” and then more 
solemnly, “Oh, thank God! I ’m so glad.” 

“What is it?* what is it?” cried Sue and 
Carol, simultaneously. “Please tell us! We 
have n’t understood a word of it.” 

“You poor things!” he exclaimed gaily. 
“Listen! I ’ll translate it for you. It ’s very 
short.” And he went on to translate from the 
ancient paper as follows : 

I who write this am the Dauphin of France, who 
should have been Louis XVII. I escaped from the 
Temple Tower in my tenth year by means which I shall 
not attempt to explain here. All that is known to others 
who could make it public to the world if I so wished. 
I do not, however, wish it. My only desire is to remain 
forever hidden. Should there, however, arise at any 
future time a cause or reason for making descendants 
of mine aware of the truth of their real ancestry, I wish 
to make this statement. I have no descendants. The 
boy whom Jean Mettot supposes to be my son is no flesh- 
and-blood heir of mine. The boy is the son of my wife 
by her former husband. He was a young child, less 
than two years old, when I married her, and so fond 
did I become of him that I felt no difference and wished 
to feel no more difference than if he were truly my own. 
But no Bourbon blood runs in his veins, praise God, 
260 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

and heirs of his may never inherit the throne of France. 
I am ill and weak, when writing this, and I feel that 
death is not far away. Only Jean Mettot knows the 
hiding-place I have designed for this document. I pray 
God there may never be need to disclose it. 

Louis Charles. 

“But — but,” stammered Sue, when Louis 
had finished, “what does this mean?” 

“It means,” cried Louis, “that I haven’t a 
drop of Bourbon blood in me! It means that 
I ’m a plain, American boy, after all!” 

He threw his cap into the air exultantly and 
shouted another hurrah. 

Strangely enough, it was Sue who first gave 
a thought to the marquis. Glancing suddenly 
toward him, she exclaimed in a low voice: 

“O Monsieur!” 

He was still standing in the same tense atti- 
tude, his expression dazed and unbelieving. 
Not one of them but expected that this news, 
so happy to Louis, so tragic to him, might 
cause an attack, possibly a fatal one, of his 
physical ailment. But the marquis was made 
of sterner stuff than they knew. With a sud- 
261 


PARADISE GREEN 


den squaring of his shoulders, he walked over 
to the window and stood staring out, his back 
toward them all, his hands clenched behind him. 

So long did he remain thus, that the tense 
silence became almost unbearable. It was 
Louis at last, with his head up and the kindest 
expression the girls had ever seen in his eyes, 
who walked over to Monsieur and laid a hand 
on his shoulder. 

“Will you forgive me, sir,” he said very 
quietly, “for my beastly expressions of joy? 
I ought to have realized what a blow this news 
would be to you, — whatever it may mean to 
me.” 

The marquis turned and looked deep into his 
eyes. 

“My boy,” he spoke in a husky voice, “you 
are worthy to he the lineal descendant of a 
king, even if fate has willed that you are not.” 

He could say no more at that moment, and 
Louis went on : 

“I want you to know I feel, sir, that my obli- 
gation to you remains precisely the same, even 
262 


THE IMP MAKES A DISCOVERY 

though conditions are changed. I owe you 
everything I have. You undoubtedly will no 
longer contemplate taking me for your adopted 
son. There is n’t the slightest reason for it 
now. But I want to give you and the country 
you love the very best that is in me. I am an 
American of the Americans, and I ’m prouder 
of it than ever. But I want to ‘do my bit’ for 
France and for you. Will you allow me, sir, 
to go with you to France and join the French 
Flying Corps? It is the only way that I can 
repay you.” 

The marquis was still gazing straight into 
the boy’s eyes. Now he laid both hands on 
his shoulders. 

“You shall have your wish, my boy,” he said, 
still huskily. “I now see that I should never 
have striven to restrain you. But, king or no 
king, an adopted son of mine you shall be, if 
you yourself will consent to it. I love you for 
yourself. What matters any other reason? 
But, before God, I promise you that in no way 
will I put the slightest obstacle in the path you 
263 


PARADISE GREEN 

have chosen for yourself. France will yet be 
as proud of you as I am. Louis Charles, will 
you be my son?” 

“I never knew any parents,” answered 
Louis, in a shaky, unsteady voice, “and I ’ve — 
I ’ve missed them horriblv. Will vou be — my 
father?” 

When the girls looked around, they found 
that old Mr. Meadows and his daughter had 
vanished from the room. At Sue’s beckoning 
finger, the three girls tiptoed out after them. 


264 


CHAPTER XVIII 


THE END OF THE JOURNAL 

S EPTEMBER 25, 1914. It’s so long 
since I ’ve written in this journal that I ’m 
quite discouraged about it. Not a single entry 
have I made since that wonderful day over at 
Louis’s when they found the document. Well, 
there has n’t been much to write about, and 
we ’ve all felt lonely and blue and apprehensive 
(that ’s the only word I can think of to express 
it) ever since Louis sailed for France. 

They did not get away quite as soon as they 
had expected. Changed conditions and sailing 
dates delayed them a week or morelonger than 
the original plan. I think it was at least the 
twentieth of August before they left for New 
York and their steamer. 

Oh, it is such a. desolate place now, across the 
Green, since they went away, — all shut up and 
dark and lonely! But Monsieur has left the 
265 


PARADISE GREEN 


key with us, and asked us to go through it once 
in a while to see that everything was all right. 
In the spring he intends to have an architect 
come and restore the “long kitchen” to exactly 
its former appearance, and to put all the rest 
of the house in good shape. He says that, 
since Louis wishes it so much, he shall come 
back here whenever there is an opportunity, 
that is, whenever his duties will permit, and 
that he can live here as long as he likes. That 
is glorious news. We are all so happy about 
it, and Louis was just wild with joy. 

Rut will he come back? That is the awful 
question. Aviation is dangerous enough, even 
here in a peaceful country. What earthly 
chance of life has one over there in the midst 
of this horrible war? It makes me shudder 
every time I think of it, and I don’t dare think 
of it much. I have awful nightmares about it 
every night. 

The Imp has taken to reading up everything 
she can find on the subject, and she insists on 
telling us hair-raising tales about the dangers 
and accidents that happen to military aviators. 

266 


THE END OF THE JOURNAL 

I asked her once if it did n’t simply make her 
sick to think of such things in connection with 
Louis, but she only said : 

“Oh, no! Louis ’s not going to have things 
like that happen to him, He ’s different 1” I 
only wish I had her faith. 

Louis’s departure with the marquis was a 
nine-days’ wonder here, of course. Everybody 
talked about it incessantly for a while, specu- 
lating at the greatest length on why in the 
world a French nobleman should do such an 
eccentric thing. But naturally, no one except 
we three girls ever guessed the truth, or ever 
will. For it was the marquis’s wish that, even 
as things turned out, the truth about the dau- 
phin should never be made public. 

We have all gone back to school, and are 
plodding along in the same prosaic way. The 
only thing we ’re doing that really interests us 
is to knit an outfit for Louis — a sweater, a hel- 
met, some wristlets, and socks. He said be- 
fore he left that he ’d probably need them, and 
we promised to make them as quickly as pos- 
sible. 


267 


PARADISE GREEN 

September 28. We had a letter from Louis 
to-day, — the first since he left. Of course it 
caused the wildest excitement. He said they 
had a safe voyage across, and he was n’t sea- 
sick a minute, though the marquis and old Mr. 
Meadows were very ill. Louis said that they 
went straight to Paris, and there the marquis 
used his influence and had him enlisted in the 
French Air Service. In a few days Louis was 
notified to report for duty at the Hotel des 
Invalides. Here he went through his physical 
examination, passed it, and then was sent to 
Dijon to get his outfit, which is provided by 
the government. After going through all 
that, he was sent to Pau (we ’ve looked up 
these places in the Atlas, and know exactly 
where they are!) to become a member of the 
flying-school. 

Louis had been there only a week when he 
wrote this letter, but he says that, owing to the 
hard study he put in on Page Calvin’s machine, 
he ’s almost perfect in the mechanical parts, — 
the engine and steering, — and instead of hav- 
ing to spend several weeks at that, he can soon 
268 


THE END OF THE JOURNAL 

begin the actual flying. Of course I don’t 
understand all his technical talk, but one thing 
is easy to see — he ’s completely and absolutely 
happy . He says he ’ll write again when he ’s 
actually “been up,” but that he has hardly a 
moment to himself during the day, and at night 
he ’s so tired that he almost falls asleep on the 
way to bed. The French course must be very 
strict and exacting. 

November 22, 1914. I did n’t suppose it 
would be so long before I ’d write here again, 
but there ’s generally nothing much to write. 
Paradise Green has returned to its old, sleepy 
nonentity of a place since Louis went away. 
Only one thing has stirred the quiet surface of 
our family. Dave has been extremely morose 
and uneasy ever since Louis’s departure, and 
yesterday he launched a thunderbolt in our 
midst by asking Father if he could go off to 
“the front” and enlist in the French army. 
Father was very quiet about it, but he refused 
absolutely. Then Dave broke down and blub- 
bered like a baby. He said he wanted to do 
269 


PARADISE GREEN 


something to help in this beastly mess, and that 
he thought America was “rotten” not to get 
into it, too. But F ather said : 

“If America ever does get into it, Dave, 
you ’ll go with my full permission, — but not till 
then!” So Dave had to be content with that. 

We heard from Louis to-day, — the most 
wonderful letter! Two weeks ago he finished 
his course in aviation and was ordered to duty 
at the front. So off he went (he was n’t al- 
lowed to tell us where the “front” was) and 
has been there ever since, scouting over the 
enemy’s lines in a biplane with the chef pilote , 
to familiarize himself with conditions. He will 
soon be actively engaged with the enemy. It 
makes me sick and cold to think of it. Will we 
ever see Louis alive again, walking about 
Paradise Green in the old way? I have sim- 
ply made up my mind that it is not possible, — 
that if it ever happens, it will be nothing short 
of a miracle . 

On looking back in this journal, I find that 
I have kept it exactly one year. I have ful- 
filled my promise to Miss Cullingford, and I 
no 


THE END OF THE JOURNAL 

believe, if she could only read it, she ’d find it 
a very interesting “supplement to history.” 
But of course she never will read it. That 
would be breaking my promise to the marquis. 
I do not think I will write in it any more. 
The year is over, and Louis has gone — and 
may never come back any more. 

April 10, 1917. To-day, in an old drawer 
of my desk, locked away and almost com- 
pletely forgotten by me, I found this journal 
that I kept three long years ago. How long, 
how very long they seem now! I was sixteen 
then, and still in high school. I am nineteen — 
nearly twenty — now, and have been a year in 
college. At present I am home for the Easter 
vacation, back in little Paradise Green, and in 
rummaging through my desk I found this 
journal. The idea has come to me to add one 
more entry, because it will make the story com- 
plete. 

When I last wrote here, I was positively cer- 
tain that Louis would die, that he would be 
killed in some terrible battle or have some acci- 
271 


PARADISE GREEN 


dent to his aeroplane. Nothing of the sort has 
occurred, marvelous as it may seem. Yes, the 
miracle has happened, and Louis, our same old 
Louis, is back in his home on Paradise Green! 
What is more, the Meadows, or Mettots, as I 
now call them, are back here with him, just as 
in the old days. It ’s too wonderful for words ! 

But the marquis is not here. He never will 
be here any more, for he died a year ago, leav- 
ing his title and what little remains of his estate 
to Louis. The greater part of it has been 
turned over to the French Government. 

But Louis! Oh, that has been the wonder- 
ful part of the story ! He has been known for 
two years as one of the most daring and suc- 
cessful members of the French Aviation Corps, 
with a record of captured enemy machines and 
successful engagements to be proud of. He 
has been decorated by the French Government 
and honored in a dozen ways, and has never 
been wounded or injured till just lately. 

In an engagement at Eaucourt l’Abbaye 
last October, toward the finish of the great 
Somme battle, he was wounded in the side, but 

rtf, 


THE END OF THE JOURNAL 

managed to land his machine safely. The 
wound was not serious in itself, but his old 
enemy, blood-poisoning, set in, and for a while 
it was nip-and-tuck whether he could recover. 
But Louis says his constitution is “sound 
American,” and after a long siege he was pro- 
nounced out of danger and recovered. He has 
been compelled by his commanding officer, 
however, to take a long leave of absence, to 
recover complete health before he returns to 
the front. 

So he came back to Paradise Green, to take 
up life, as he says, where he left it. During 
this Easter vacation we four have been rollick- 
ing around, just as we used to when we were 
children and hadn’t a care on our minds. 
Carol is as grown-up as I am, and is attending 
college with me. The Imp is a tall, lanky 
creature now, nearly through high school, and 
at times can be quite as exasperating as ever. 
They say she ’s cut out for a brilliant future, 
but just at present her whole mind is concen- 
trated on becoming a Red Cross nurse, so that 
she can go off to “the front” and get in the 


PARADISE GREEN 

thick of it. Mother and Father won’t stand 
for it, of course, but trust the Imp to get her 
way — somehow. 

And that brings me to another thing. 
America has at last entered the war. We can 
scarcely believe it yet. Louis is jubilant, and 
Dave promptly claimed the promise that Fa- 
ther made him three years ago. Father has 
consented, as he said he would, but is feeling 
pretty grave about it. And the look in Moth- 
er’s eyes is enough to keep Dave from effer- 
vescing too openly. I dare not think very far 
into the future, but for the immediate present 
we all are trying to be happy. 

I had almost decided to destroy this journal, 
but something Louis told us has made me 
change my mind. He said that before Mon- 
sieur (I cannot get out of the habit of calling 
him that!) passed away, he told Louis that he 
had changed his mind about keeping secret any 
longer the story of Louis’s descent. He said 
that he believed the dauphin would have been 
filled with pride at the wonderful attainments 
and service to France of the descendant of his 
274 


THE END OF THE JOURNAL 

own adopted son, and would glory in the 
world’s knowledge of his connection with him. 
So Louis said that, although he was n’t ever 
going to say anything about it himself, he 
did n’t specially care if the rest of us did. The 
matter seemed of little importance to him, any- 
how. He said that probably no one would be- 
lieve it, anyway, as there were too many stories 
already concerning the escape and claims of 
the “lost dauphin.” 

Probably they won’t, and I would n’t blame 
them, for it does seem well-nigh incredible. 
However that may be, I ’ve changed my mind 
about this journal. I ’m going to show it to 
Miss Cullingford. She and I have always 
been great friends, even after I left high 
school, and I want her to read for herself the 
whole history of this wonderful thing that hap- 
pened on little, out-of-the-way Paradise Green. 


THE END 


275 


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L.RBWr'26 




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